


Unexpected Wide Eyes

by Psychotic_Angst



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: BAMF Minerva McGonagall, Blaise Zabini is amazing, Eventual Smut?, Fluff and Angst, Good Draco Malfoy, I haven't decided, M/M, Other, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Ron Weasley is a Good Friend, Tags Are Hard
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-01
Updated: 2018-01-24
Packaged: 2019-02-26 06:01:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 25,834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13229529
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Psychotic_Angst/pseuds/Psychotic_Angst
Summary: As they approached Hagrid’s cabin, the first reaction to their public declaration of friendship was made. Harry saw that Ron noticed them first, and after looking like he had been told he would have to marry Aragog and move into the forbidden forest to bear children...- Or: Set during Ootp,Harry and Draco meet on a tower, they realise that they're better off as friends, and this is what subsequently happens





	1. Towers, the library, and wide-eye ablaze

**Author's Note:**

> So it begins directly during the first evening on the first school day, where Harry received his detention from Umbridge for arguing in class. 
> 
>  
> 
> So this is my first ever Fanfiction so please bear with me... It's scary enough already!  
> I hope someone out there likes it, honestly I'll be overjoyed with even one comment  
> Hopefully my style of writing isn't too bad, but I'm all for any form of constructive criticism!!
> 
> Also I hope there wasn't too much for a first chapter, I don't want to exhaust anyone!
> 
> so.. without further ado...

“Harry, are you okay? You’re not really focusing on your homework and you keep looking into the fire.”

The boy with the raven hair and lightning-shaped scar blinked his glazed over eyes and turned towards his best friend. “I’m fine Hermione, it’s just been a really long day.” His reply had been short, concise with his opinion on how the day went.

“Give the poor guy a break Hermione, he got a weeks’ worth of detentions from that old toad for telling her the truth about you-know-who. He doesn’t need you to lecture him as well.” His other best friend’s reply to Hermione was well meant, but Harry suspected it was because he was looking for an excuse to also not have to do homework on the very first school day of the year.

“I wasn’t going to lecture him!” She snapped violently which made Ron put his hands up in self-defence. “I was just worried that’s all, you mustn’t let that idiotic women get to you.”

It was true, he mustn’t. He knew that she was trying to provoke him in every way shape and form. Everything that Hermione had said about her ill intentions the prior night was all but confirmed by Mcgonagall. She was out to enforce the ministries warped control on Hogwarts. But if Harry was going to be honest with himself, his lack of focus on homework had nothing to do with the outcome of the day. It was the way Malfoy had looked at him as he stormed out the Defence class. Harry had expected to turn and see the blonde openly snicker at him, or at least give him the smug glare that he had often thrown Harrys way. But when Harry turned around with pink message in hand, all he saw was Malfoys wide open eyes, looking in shock at the events before him. If Harry hadn’t known better, he would say that Malfoy was worried for him. But that couldn’t be true, they despised each other. Firstly, Malfoy never would give up a chance to show glee at the other boy’s misfortune. Secondly, he was guaranteed to have been told about the events that unfolded in the graveyard by his father, who had been summoned there by Voldermort, and watched as he attempted to finally put an end to the boy who lived. Yet there he was, staring at the raven head with seemingly concerned eyes. Harry didn’t know what to think of it.

Coming to a decision, Harry stood up. “I’m going to call it a night. Don’t look at me like that Hermione, I’m fine okay? I’ll do the homework tomorrow, I just want to rest now, goodnight.” He stopped to wait for them to apprehensively nod at Harry before he walked up to the dormitory. However, he wasn’t planning sleeping anytime soon, he grabbed his invisibility cloak and map from his bag and swung it over himself. He shut the drapes that surrounded his bed, knowing full well that Ron would not want to impede upon his privacy. With a final look and no real idea to where his destination was going to be, he crept back downstairs, past his two friends who he saw to his confusion one of them attempting to knit away. He was lucky that the portrait to outside the common hall was just out of eyeshot where his friends were sitting, as he silently opened it up and snuck past the sleeping fat lady.

He started to walk down the corridor, quickly but cautiously. With no real idea of where he was heading he figured he should first check the map, to make sure that wherever the likes of Umbridge was, he was not. He checked the map and searched for Umbridge, who he found in the confines of her office. His mind wandered devilishly to the idea of throwing dungbombs at her door, however before he could sincerely appreciate the thought his eyes lingered over to the over side of the map, seeing something that nearly almost instantaneously had him walking in the same direction until he stopped to think. Draco Malfoys name, at the top of one of the towers. Harry wondered what he was doing there, without his cronies, or anyone for that matter. The blonde boys name wasn’t moving, and it looked as if nobody was even in that corner of the castle. Making up his mind in a matter of seconds, and making a mental note to not tell Hermione (or Ron for that matter) about who he was about to spy on, Harry started to rush off to the tower where Malfoy was.

 

Not really out of breath but still wondering how he managed to get across half the castle in such a small amount of time, Harry peered around the corner to look at Malfoy. He was sitting on the parapet with his back against the wall staring up at the stars. Harry never realised until then, but Malfoy looked quite elegant in the moonlight, his blonde hair radiating against it and his grey eyes almost sparkling while he starred up into the sky. Harry shook his head, pushing out them thoughts and questioning why he even would think that. But he still continued to stare at Malfoy, looking so serene against the night sky. After a few minutes or so Harry took a step back so he would not be seen. Coming to a decision he hopes he won’t regret later, he silently took off his cloak and hid both that and the map away. Taking in a large breath and reminding himself yet again to never tell his friends of what he was about to do, Harry walked forward into the tower room.

“Malfoy?” Harry said cautiously. The other boy nearly jumped at his name being spoke before whipping his head around and pointing the tightly gripped wand in hand at the raven head. His expression was of pure shock, obviously not expecting to be disturbed while up here. Harry noticed that he slightly lowered his wand upon realising who he was pointing at, and his eyes grey had widened, reminiscent of what happened earlier in class.

“P-potter.” He stuttered back, words unable to form fast enough for him to speak. “Wh-what the hell are you doing up here?! Sneaking up on me like that in the middle of the night.”

Harry looked faux-calmly at the blonde, but awkwardly thinking of what he was exactly going to say to him, and how he would explain how he came about being here. “Sorry. I’m just here I suppose, no reason. Needed to get away from everyone, you know?”

Malfoy was looking carefully at Harry, probably trying to detect if this was some kind of elaborate trick. However, he took a deep sigh and lowered his wand while reaching up to move his hand through his hair, slowly closing his eyes before looking back towards him.

“Yeah, I know that feeling all too well.” He sighed again deeply. “Must have been a rough day for you Potter? Umbridge and everyone and their own mother thinking you’re a liar must be exhausting.” He didn’t say it with malice like Harry would have expected him to, he said it with a hint of deep sympathy for him.

“Pretty much.” Nodded Harry. He stared back at Malfoy before asking, “Do you believe me then?”

Malfoy glanced from Harry towards the floor before laughing darkly and grimacing. “Don’t be stupid Potter. My father was there at the graveyard. He told me everything the moment I got back home.” He looked back up at Harry and saw the look on his face. He quickly added, “Don’t get me wrong Potter, a lot has changed the past summer. It may be hard for you to realise this but, I-I don’t want you dead, and I don’t want the dark lord…him… from killing you and winning.” He looked at Harry with almost a pleading look in his eyes, as if he was begging Harry to stay alive.

Harry was dumbstruck. In front of him was his five-year school rival. The blonde boy who offered him his friendship, but got told no because of the way he treated the first person to ever be truly nice to Harry. From then on they were sworn enemies. But now? Here was the exact same boy telling Harry he doesn’t want him dead, doesn’t want him losing to Voldermort.

“You, you don’t support Voldermort?” Harry whispered at Malfoy, ignoring the shudder he gave when hearing the dark lords name.

“Why would I?” he asked quietly.

“Oh I don’t know.” Harry’s voice slowly rising as inbuilt anger seared from him. “Maybe because your father is a death-eater and tried to kill me, twice. Maybe because he also gave Ginny Voldermort’s diary to awaken the basilisk and kill all the muggle-borns, and probably Ginny too.  Maybe because I bet you anything he was one of the ones causing trouble at the quidditch world cup as well!” He ended his words with a glare of anger at Malfoy, but was surprised to see no glare back. In fact he was pretty certain that the blonde was looking almost apologetically at Harry.

“You mentioned my father, Potter, but you didn’t mention me.” He started off quietly, looking down at the floor as if not wanting to say anything to promote the other boy’s anger. “It’s true, my father did all that. I didn’t know about the diary until this summer, when I overheard him talking to mother about the dark lord’s reaction to it being destroyed. I don’t really know if he was one of the ones causing trouble at the world cup, but I guess he must have been.” He shrugged and looked back up to Harry, who noticed that his eyes spoke the truth, every word was the truth. “It’s like I said. A lot has changed since the summer. My father was stupid, but I think he has regrets. He doesn’t want to see me or my mother get in harm’s way, so he doesn’t really have much of a choice. It’s like the dark lord is forever holding him at wand point. You don’t know what that’s like.”

“You’d be surprised, considering my parents and me were at wand point by Voldermort, and I’m the only one left.”

Malfoys eyes widened in horror as he realised his mistake, “P-Potter, I didn’t mean that, sorry it wa-

“It doesn’t matter Malfoy, I know.” Harry grimaced at him. “Tell me, what happened during the summer?” He silently admitted to himself, he was curious. He wanted to know what caused such a change in Malfoy.

“Well, I suppose it started when I got back home. I believed you, the moment you came out of the maze holding… Cedric’s body. But nobody spoke about it. Not till I got back to the manor. My parents, my father especially, they both looked so pale. Like they hadn’t eaten or slept, they were so glad when I was home. It made me wonder if they were scared something was going to happen to me. I asked them what was going on. They told me he was back, the dark lord. I asked them what side they were on. I still remember the way they glanced at each other. My father told me they had to stick together, and that no matter what his priority was the safety of his family.” Malfoy sighed heavily, turning briefly to look up at the stars again. “After that, things went by as normal. I started to realise that the ministry didn’t believe a word you had said, the daily prophet was slandering you and Dumbledore at every chance. I knew that this could only mean trouble, the ministry wasn’t looking for him, but on the plus side my father was safe, kind of. He had to attend meetings. I remember, waking up at around three in the morning to shouts of pain. I crept downstairs, saw my father. He looked a mess. My mother was attending to him. He told her that the dark lord found out about the diary. He was angry. My mother was nearly crying. She asked him what they were going to do. He didn’t know. Just that they had to stick together. I heard her ask if they should keep me from going back to Hogwarts. But then he said that Hogwarts would be the safest place for me, as long as Dumbledore was still there.”

Harry looked on towards Malfoy. He was looking up at the sky, his eyes glistening. Harry wasn’t sure if it was tears forming or just the reflection from the stars, all he knew was he didn’t want to mention it to Malfoy. He walked forward and put his hand on the blonde’s shoulder. They turned and looked towards each other, the one staring at him, pleading with his eyes. The other only being able to offer a sympathetic gesture.

“Your father was right. This is the safest place for you to be. Voldermort wouldn’t dare attack here, especially when he’s trying to hide from the ministry.”

“I know. But my parents. They’re still there. And it frightens me. I know they can’t be killed without drawing attention but, the dark lord can hurt them. I don’t want them to be hurt.”

Harry didn’t know what to say. This was the first time he had ever seen this side of Malfoy. Scared, vulnerable. Seeing him showing these emotions was strange to Harry, but he should have realised sooner. Even someone like Malfoy would be able to love. He wasn’t Voldermort, he cared about people just as much as Harry did.

What Harry did next was unexpected, even to him. He reached out, closed the gap between them and hugged Malfoy. “Your parents will be fine, Malfoy. They’re brave, and strong, and they need you to be brave for them as well as yourself. I know it must be hard, trying not to worry constantly. But your parents are survivors. Hell, they’re Slytherin for a reason. Cunning and self-preservation through and through.” He chuckled and stood back, and saw that Malfoy was smiling, and also blushing?

“Tha-thanks Potter. You’re right. They’ll get by, I know it.” He smiled as he looked at the raven head. “Do you think, we could be friends? I know that, we haven’t always seen eye to eye. Okay, that was an understatement. But, honestly. I’ve grown up, a lot, and I realised I was a little prick in the past. I want to make up for my mistakes, and my fathers as well.”

*

If Harry had been told that on the first school night of the year he was going to be making friends with Draco Malfoy, he’d have thought someone spent a bit too long in a room full of mandrakes without ear muffs. Nevertheless, that night ended with the raven-haired boy and the blonde shaking hands for the first time, promising that now on they will do their hardest to get along, and also attempt to talk to each on first name basis. Harry had wondered how Draco was going to get back to his common room, but he was reminded that the blonde was a prefect, with slightly more leeway when it came to curfew, and jokingly assured Harry that ‘A Slytherin knows how to avoid detection’.

Harrys second day began as awkward as the first, Seamus was still acting like he was a nutter who was likely to explode at any notice and Dean, as his best friend could only give the occasional apologetic glance towards Harry, who was starting to feel mildly irritated. As Harry, Ron and Hermione were walking down to the great hall, the raven head noticed the all too apparent stares that students were giving him. While his two friends were attempting to distract him (which he appreciated greatly) he couldn’t help but notice the pointing, the whispers and the laughter. Once they got through the doors into the hall and walked over to sit at the table Harry noticed Malfoy (or Draco, as he kept having to remind himself in his head) talking to his friend Blaise over some coffee. When the blonde boy saw that Harry was watching him, he smiled and politely nodded in his direction which Harry reciprocated. They hadn’t carved out the parameters of their friendship the night before, so they were both quite unaware if the other was content with people knowing they had made amends. However, nobody had noticed their brief interaction so both avoided what could have been awkward conversations with their friends. It made the raven head wonder how he was going to deal with telling Hermione and Ron about his new friendship. While he knew Hermione was always the open-minded of the two, with her pursuit of ‘international, magical, cooperation – making friends’, he also knew that the blonde had said numerous insults her way in the past, not to mention the time she had punched him in third year (which memory still brought glee to the trio to this day). Ron, Harry was certain was not going to be appreciative of this, and he honestly had no idea what he could say to help the no doubt upcoming situation. As the post came down, followed with the Daily Prophet’s unironic daily numerous articles on how both Dumbledore and Harry were completely insane, Harry pushed all thoughts of Draco out of his head. It would have to wait for now.

Their first two classes, transfiguration and charms both started with Professor McGonagall and Flitwick respectively telling them just how hard their O.W.L.S were going to be. In charms, they were tasked with revising the summoning charm something Harry had mastered the previous year. By the end of the lesson only Harry, Hermione and one other student was able to pull it off, which meant only they had slightly less homework to what would be the largest amount they had been given so far in the subject. Professor McGonagall decided to make them practise vanishing spells, giving them each a snail with which to practise on. Although she had told them that invertebrates were many times easier to vanish than mammals, only Hermione was able to pull it off. Subsequently, she was the only one to not receive a vast amount of homework.

 

Starting to worry about the ever-growing amounts of homework they had been given, the three had decided to set off to the library. However much to Harry’s minor chagrin, Hermione remembered that her and Ron were on prefect duty for that lunch. Subsequently Harry set off to the library alone, attempting to not be reminded at how disappointed he was at not being a prefect. As he was walking through the library he once again started to notice the glances and whispers around him. He was just about to give up and turn back when he saw Draco sitting alone at a table attempting to write Snape’s essay. Debating whether it would be okay to go and sit with the blonde, his answer came in the form of said blonde looking up to notice Harry alone, beckoning him to sit with him. Smiling at the fact that the Slytherin had so obviously called him over, Harry obliged.

“So, what brings you down here Harry?” The blonde asked, almost awkwardly, as if he didn’t know how to begin conversation with the raven head.

“Well I was hoping to get some homework done, but I’m starting to feel like the main attraction at a zoo,” Harry replied while unpacking his bag and attempting not to look at his surroundings.

Draco looked thoughtfully at the other boy, and then expressed quite loudly (Madam Pince was not in earshot), “Of course, I hope people would remember this is a library where the only things they should be staring at are books, not people. And I’m a _prefect_.” He emphasised on the last word, which caused the majority of people staring at Harry to disperse into the book shelves. He grinned evilly at Harry, who couldn’t help but grin back. “That should hopefully get rid of them. Think you’re quite done with stares after last year.”

“Think I was done with the staring first week into first year,” Harry nodded darkly.

“I am surprised though. Why didn’t Dumbledore make you a prefect?” The blonde asked, mild curiosity in his voice.  “I would have thought you were the obvious pick, no offence to Weasley.”

“I dunno, honestly. Probably cause I cause too much trouble,” He said with a light smile. Harry had thought about it, as he had done on many different occasions. He couldn’t deny that he was jealous that Ron got it.  Even after Sirius had told him that neither him nor his father became prefects, Harry still thought about it, a lot. But he was happy for his best friend, it meant a lot to him and his mum, who Harry thought needed the good news after the Percy incident. “Dumbledore’s been ignoring me, I think.” He revealed as an afterthought to Draco.

The blonde gave Harry a surprised look, and questioned why he would think that. After having a lengthy discussion about it, neither boy could think of a logical reason why the headmaster would be ignoring Harry, especially after the events of last year. Draco was shocked to hear that even though the man had defended the raven head at his hearing, he refused to make eye contact and rushed out after the verdict. While attempting to persuade Harry that he was sure Dumbledore had a logical reason for doing so, the thought still unnerved him.

After realising they had spent half of lunch debating Dumbledore’s motives, the two boys realised they still had a mountain of homework to do. However they soon discovered that when they put their heads together, they could get quite a bit done. The blonde was able to help Harry with his potions work on the properties of moonstone and Harry was able to reciprocate by helping the other with charms work, as they discovered that they had the same homework despite being in separate classes. Happy that two pieces of homework were sorted within the duration of one lunch break, and admitting to himself that this was the quickest he’s ever done homework without Hermione’s help, Harry and Draco decided that they should work together more often if the occasion called for it.

“Normally its only Blaise and me that have decent conversations, Pansy is okay when she’s not ranting about someone she hates and mostly Crabbe and Goyle just, well they grunt a lot..”

“Do you still hang around with them two?”

“Kind of. It’s complicated. Father told me that I should keep up appearances, especially that their parents are, well you know. Truthfully I’ve been trying to keep my distance, I’m afraid I know who their loyalties would be to between me and the dark lord. But I don’t think they are even aware their parents are still doing that. I haven’t heard either of them mention anything about it, and I don’t exactly want to bring it up with them. They’re not the smartest of people, so they aren’t bothered when I’m not with them at least.”

“What about your other friends? What do they think about, about everything?”

“Blaise and Pansy think like I do, but them two are really all I know of. Tensions are high in Slytherin at the moment. Nobody knows who to trust. I know everyone else thinks we’re all mad death-eater wannabes but it’s not. Most of them just want to survive, they don’t particularly want to side with the murderers to do that though.”

Harry stared dumbstruck. His mind wandered back to when Ron told him ‘there’s not a single witch or wizard who went bad who wasn’t in Slytherin’. But here was evidence to the contrary. More so than this, it was starting to dawn on Harry that prejudice existed both ways, and that assuming everyone in Slytherin were supporters of Voldermort was really downright stupidity. “Does anyone in there support him?”

“Not a really easy question to answer.” Draco sighed. “That’s the problem, we don’t know. We only know as far as to who we speak to, and even then its not that easy. Take me for example, everyone assumes I’m all for it, because of my father. Nobody will ask me though because they don’t want what they think will be an awkward conversation. Then there’s Crabbe and Goyle, like I said I don’t even know if they’re aware of what’s going on. But then there’s Theo. I’m pretty certain his father told him everything like mine. But neither of us have said a word to each other about it, cause we’re both unsure of where our position stand, he may feel the same way as me, but afraid that I’m like my father and would rat him out. That’s just those who were known to be death eaters. Everything else is even hazier, which makes it more difficult to know who your allies are.” He sighed again, looking near exhausted at the explanation he had to give Harry.

“But you trust Pansy and Blaise?”

“Pansy and I have been friends since childhood, I trust her with my life. As for Blaise… he’s a weird one.” He let out a short laugh.

“What do you mean weird?”

“Blaise has always been eccentric, I think he gets it from his mother. He’s quite open, in fact you wouldn’t think he was a Slytherin the way he acts. While everyone else in the common room have their eyes darting around wondering who to trust, Blaise prances around declaring it like one commenting on the weather. I don’t think he has ever agreed with pure blood philosophy. He also knows how to rile up everyone in the house. Sometimes I think he does it just to see their faces, but I’m pretty sure he’s analysing them all, working out how people think. That’s how I know he’s a true Slytherin. But the others think he’s mad. Even in first year he used to say how he didn’t give a damn about blood status and I quote ‘only beautiful things matter in life’.” Draco snickered at the memory.

The raven head was starting to wonder just how many conversations he was going to be able to have with the blonde without being rendered speechless. Everything seemingly coming out of his mouth was contradicting everything he knew. Draco was kind. He didn’t support Voldermort. His father has regrets. Not everyone in Slytherin were bigots. All this new information really was starting to make Harry’s head spin.

“How does everyone else think about muggle-borns?” Harry asked warily.

Draco glanced at him and shifted nervously. “I think most still think highly of each other being pure-blood.”

“What about you, what do you think?”

Again the boy shifted uncomfortably, “I’ll admit, it’s not been easy getting rid of… ideology I’ve been brought up with. But mostly, I couldn’t give a damn about it.” He hesitantly looked at Harry to see him smiling at his last comment, and continued. “I’ve spent far too many years being beaten by Granger in class to consider a correlation between superiority and blood. Not to mention her punching skills.” He shuddered, and Harry couldn’t help but let out a laugh. It was nice to know that it wasn’t just the trio who had vivid memories of that faithful day. “I think I was just a little brat, and most of us are, to think we were better than others because we can trace back our lineage. But I’m over it, if anything Blaise has made sure of that, both me and Pans.”

“Wow, remind me to shake Blaise’s hand for slapping some sense into you.”

“No Harry, that was Granger, literally.”

Both the boys threw their heads back and laughed. Neither was aware that somewhere in the library Madam Pince had heard happiness in her sacrosanct dominion, and was now prowling the shelves to seek out the perpetrators. In fact, although the boys had kept a low voice during the conversation to avoid any eavesdropping, they had in fact only had eyes for one another the entire time. Everything around them didn’t matter while they were talking, and deep-down Draco was wondering if this is how it would have felt if they had been friends since first year rather than their still new flowering friendship.

After realising they had better make their way down to care of magical creatures, the raven head and the blonde packed up their stuff and left the library in a much more happier (and louder) mood than they had upon entering, unbeknownst to them that Madam Pince had spotted the source of laughter, and was secretly wondering whether she could hex their happy faces off to remind pupils, that the library is not for laughter but learning.

*

The walk down to the grounds had been a weird one. People were staring as they walked, but they figured it was more to the unlikely duo than anything else. Draco had assured Harry he wasn’t worried at what anyone thought of them when the raven head expressed his concern for the blonde’s reputation. Everyone would either assume his father had told him to spy on Harry for Voldermort or the ministry, meanwhile people would just think Harry was crazy. Despite the notion that everyone might think him crazy, Harry couldn’t help but chuckle. All in all, opinions be damned of what they thought of the two. Because the only people that opinions did matter were down in the grounds waiting for them to arrive, and they were about to be surprised when they arrived together rather than avoiding one another like a Blast-Ended Skrewt.

As they approached Hagrid’s cabin, the first reaction to their public declaration of friendship was made. Harry saw that Ron noticed them first, and after looking like he had been told he would have to marry Aragog and move into the forbidden forest to bear children, he slapped the side of Hermione who had been looking the other way to get her attention. When she turned around her jaw dropped, and Harry was sure that she had just managed to not let out a little shriek of surprise. Meanwhile on his left, Draco had been observing the manner in which his own friends had reacted. Pansy had paled to that of a ghost upon noticing the two, and had grabbed the arm of Blaise, who seemed to be so shocked at the scene in front of him that he was unable to make any facial expression. However Draco wasn’t to be fooled, Blaise was by far the most cunning of the Slytherin pack. He proved to be correct, because in a matter of moments Blaise’s whole demeanour changed and he swaggeringly walked forward after unhinging himself from Pansy, and went towards the two as if to greet them like old friends. This was about to get rather interesting, Draco thought.

 

“Well well, my dear Draco, you’ve made a new friend! The boy who lived no less. Why Harry, it’s a pleasure to able to finally say a decent word to you without our darling Draco getting rattled up like he has a boggart in the closet!” Blaise was, if not more eccentric than Draco had let on in Harry’s opinion. He grinned theatrically at the two of them, eyes full of opportunity. “I daresay that your friendship will be the talk of the school by the time the sun has set, unless of course…” His eyes glinted mischievously, “This is just an elaborate ploy to trick me into thinking you’ve all grown up out of your prejudices Draco dear.”

The blonde laughed scathingly in a way only Blaise knew was meant with no ill intent. “The only thing elaborate here is you Blaise, anything more elaborate and you’ll be sending howlers around the school shouting it out.”

“Don’t give him ideas!” Pansy shouted as she marched thunderstruck over to them. Closer followed by a dumbfounded Ron and Hermione.

“Harry.” Ron said as they reached him, bewilderment on his face. “What the bloody hell is going on? Why are you with the ferret?”

“Well hello to you to, Weasley.” Draco replied at the mention of the word ‘ferret’. He briskly nodded towards Granger who looked like she was about to do a doubletake at him acknowledging her so kindly.

“It’s a long story Ron, but me and Draco are friends now.” Harry said moving his hands through his hair as he looked at his best mate, hoping upon hope he wasn’t going to do anything rash.

Ron just stared, as he looked from the raven head to blonde. He took a step closer to Harry and put his hand on his forehead for a few moments, before moving back and leaning towards Hermione, still staring at the pair. “He doesn’t have a fever, but maybe Malfoy confounded him, how can we check?”

At this, Harry just burst out laughing. All the time he spent fretting on how his best mate was going to react to his sudden friendship with Draco had not prepared him for this. It paled in comparison to how he expected it to go down, in which he imagined several times could have resulted in open duelling. He reached over and grabbed Ron’s shoulder and grinned happily.

“Don’t worry mate, I’m not confounded. But trust me this is as weird to me as it is to everyone else”

“No it isn’t.”

“It’s really not.”

Both Ron and Pansy had said both things at the exact same time, and even though they were on opposite ends of the four looking towards Harry and Draco, it still caused them both to jump at the unnerving moment and look towards each other. Hermione looked amusingly towards Ron, but it was now Blaise’s turn to laugh, as he stared mischievously at everyone.

“This really is a new turn of events you’ve both sprung upon us, I expect this means we’ll all be the best of friends soon.” Blaise clapped his hands together, looking expectedly at everyone, almost as if he was daring them to say otherwise. While Harry thought Blaise sounded sarcastic in his opinion, Draco knew there was nothing sarcastic about what Blaise had said. The prospect of friendship with the famous (or infamous concerning how the Slytherins mainly felt) trio was too good an opportunity to let up. Not only would it lead to a more interesting future, to Blaise it would surely create a hell of a reaction in the common room, let alone the school at large.

“I think.” Blaise continued. “That this calls for a little get together, to promote inter-house unity. Shall we say Saturday, evening time?”

Ron just looked as if Blaise had asked him to marry him, Hermione was similar, although Harry expected she was impressed at the whole ‘inter-house unity’ being expressed by a Slytherin.

Draco Interrupted his thoughts with a slight scoff. “Blaise, as much as I’m sure they’re flattered, asking them to come to one of your (he air quoted) _get togethers_ might scar them for life.”

Blaise dramatically pretended to stagger while holding a hand to his heart. “You wound me Draco. I’d never allow anything to harm our potential new friends.” He turned to face Harry and addressed him in a business-like manner. “So Mister Potter. What say you to a little gathering to get to know one another?”

Harry considered it, fully aware that Ron and Hermione were looking at him. He honestly hadn’t expected this to go so fast, especially not as it was. He thought either Ron or Draco would be the worse off over a stinging hex, and he knew Hermione and Pansy had never enjoyed a friendly conversation. Yet here everyone was, standing together being civil. Ron and Hermione looking at Harry as if to await orders. He supposed it was up to him after all. Making a mental note to never underestimate Blaise Zabini, he replied.

“Sure.” He tried not to laugh at the ever-widening eyes of his two friends. He was pretty sure their eyes were going to turn into the size of plates at this rate. “Saturday evening, but where?”

“Oh your place or mine Mister Potter?” Blaise winked devilishly, causing Harry to turn slight red and blush. However before he could reply, Draco interjected.

“Mind it Blaise. You wouldn’t want him, Weasley or Granger to think you had any other agenda, would you?” He stared intently at Blaise, Harry couldn’t help but notice a sort of non-verbal warning pass from the blonde to the other. It seemed to have worked because Blaise sighed nonchalantly and feigned tipping his hat towards him in secession. Draco turned back to Harry. “If you’re sure you’re up for this, might I suggest our common room, we can sneak you all in under your cloak and hide you in mine and Blaise’s room.”

Harry was just about consider it when Ron hastily jumped in. “Hang on. _Yours and Blaise’s_ room? You have a room just for you two?” He stared Draco with his mouth open.

“Well where else do you expect us to sleep?”

“But is it just you that gets room for two or everyone?”

“I’m not sure I understand what you mean Weasley?”

“We have five in our room!” He yelled indignantly.

“You’re joking?!” Draco gasped while looking at the trio as he had to hold back laughter. “And I thought being in a room with Blaise alone was hard enough!”

*


	2. Toads, Cats and a kiss that can change everything

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry has new friends. Harry should not tell lies. So Harry tells the truth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so glad that people had liked it so far! I'm slowly panning everything out, but it should get heated up soon!  
> I think one thing that is getting on my nerves while I write is how to include action in a sentence, - and () inside and outside speech marks are just making my life misery as I'm trying to stay consistent. I probably shouldn't worry but I'm way too pedantic to let it go... 
> 
>  
> 
> Without further adieu: chapter 2! (I rhymed :D)

The following lesson went by unlike any other. The two trio’s, united by the raven head and the blonde was met by incredulous looks by the remainder of the class, which coincidentally was made up by a majority of Gryffindor. Although nobody said a word about the situation, Harry couldn’t help but notice the stares from his fellow peers. The class itself was interesting enough; after the batting down of questions regarding Hagrid’s whereabouts Professor Grubbly-Plank introduced them to Bowtruckles, tree-guardians that dwelled most commonly in wand-trees. After telling the class they would need to sketch one out and label all appropriate appendages, the six went off (led by an overly-enthusiastic Blaise) to a side of the table to sit next to each other. Overall, it didn’t go as awkwardly as they all no doubt imagined. Helped along by Blaise and his apparent abilities in engaging in colloquy the others managed to keep a flowing conversation going, if albeit Ron and Draco’s still use of their given surnames. The Gryffindor trio discovered that because Crabbe and Goyle had near failed all their end of term exams last year, Snape had decided to allow them to drop their elective classes prior to their fifth year rather than forcing them to retake fourth year. While Ron had in fairness tried to sound sympathetic towards this matter he couldn’t help but scoff at their joint lack of intelligence, which while the Slytherins had tried to remain solemn out of respect for their friends, they couldn’t help but privately agree with.

By the end of the class they had all surprisingly managed to draw fairly decent sketches of the creatures. It was Pansy who managed to depict it the most elegantly and Blaise (who labelled himself as a ‘purveyor of only the most finest’) had to be beaten back to assure her drawing wasn’t pilfered. As the Gryffindors had Herbology with the Hufflepuffs, the two groups made their goodbyes between the greenhouses and the entrance to the castle. With the elaborate promise from Blaise that they will meet again, the Slytherin trio left them.

Ron, after staring a few minutes to wait them go and rolling his eyes at Blaise’s theatrics turned towards Harry. “Mate, I think you just made us friends with the most crazy of the whole bunch of crazies.” He said this quite flatly, but there was a hint of amusement in his voice that made Harry know that Ron wasn’t at all angry at their sudden new friendship.

“You know Ron, you took it way better then I expected you to.”

“I suppose after spending most of summer cleaning a house with dried up elf heads on display, my brains been a bit addled.” He said with a dry laugh.

“What do you think Hermione?” Harry asked, noticing she had been a bit quiet. She considered herself for a moment before speaking.

“I’m surprised, they’re so different from what we thought of them. And I’m sure they probably think the same about us.” She looked at the ground thoughtfully before turning to Harry. “When did you suddenly make friends with Draco, it wasn’t earlier in the library was it?”

While Harry knew this was eventually going to come up, he still wasn’t aware how he was going to explain to them the events of last night. After trying carefully to make it sound like he had just wandered into Draco rather then seeking him out (he didn’t need to be reminded of his semi-obsession with the blonde) their reaction was rather placid to what he expected. Yes, Hermione warned him to not go running around at night with the ‘old toad lurking’ but once he assured her he made sure that she was safely and sadly alive in her office, Hermione seemed appeased. Ron on the other-hand was just saddened that Harry didn’t invite him along, and went off into a conversation to how he had to watch Hermione knit ‘wooly bladders’ in the attempt to free apparently unhappy house-elves. Grinning at his friends as they debated how whether or not Ron would like to have a wooly garment shoved somewhere the sun doesn’t shine, Harry made a mental note to never ever replace his friends.

The rest of the day went by fast. Harry was pleasantly surprised by the unexpected but greatly appreciated proclamation of support from one Luna Lovegood and Ernie Macmillan. However he felt less so pleasant once by the end of Herbology where they had to tend to, repot, and de-teeth Fanged Geraniums. Five minutes before class ended Professor Sprout gave them yet another essay for them to do. Leaving the greenhouse smelling strongly of dragon dung and nursing bitemarks, which Sprout had assured them has no side effects (although as Ron pointed out, this did not make the pain on his rear-end feel any way whatsoever), they wandered to the great hall. Harry’s mood was further deflated by Angelina Johnson, who had heard about his detention with Umbridge that was going to interfere with Keeper tryouts for Quidditch. Warning Harry he better beg to be let off Friday or infer the anger of the new captain, she stalked off leaving him feeling quite like the dung he had smelt of earlier.

*

 Once his impeding doom at the hands of Umbridge neared, Harry set off towards her office. He knocked on the door and heard from the other side a sickly sweet “Come in.” He pushed the door forward and closed it behind him.

*

Between a man with a garlic smelling Voldermort protruding out his head, an idiot who didn’t know anything except how to smile for a camera, a friend of his fathers who happened to transform into a seemingly dangerous beast worthy of some of Hagrid’s more dangerous pets, and an insane Azkaban escapee that albeit told Harry he should consider being an Auror, they were nothing, absolutely nothing in comparison to the many expletives that was Delores Umbridge. Everything about her sickened Harry to the core, her hideous cat themed room, her strange fixation to Fudge with her far too many photos of him that seemed to decorate the walls, all which hideously stared at her from every angle, and her quill. It was the quill that was the worst of it. The literal embodiment of what Rita Skeeter’s Quick Quotes Quill had set out to do last year in its attempt to ‘puncture’ his reputation. Except in this case it was his hand punctured, not so much his reputation. By the time he left her office, his hand was stinging intensely, the words _I must not tell lies_ scratched deep into them. Harry had a dark feeling in his head that the quill was charmed to make sure any words inflicted was going to be hell of a lot harder to heal than standard wounds. Four more days of this torture he was going to have to endure while being watched by an oversized frog and a dozen bowler-hat wearing halfwits. Harry was beyond anger. He was in fact so beyond anger that he wasn’t looking where he was going when he crashed into none other than Draco.

In an attempt to stop Harry flying to the floor, Draco had quickly grabbed him around the waist to hold him steady. After the initial disorientation Harry felt and once the potentially compromising position they were in, the blonde quickly dropped his hands and stepped back, trying to supress a look of embarrassment and a blush forming on his cheeks. Luckily the blonde wasn’t noticed, as the other was facing the exact same dilemma.

“Harry, hi. Sorry. I thought I’d linger about until you finished your detention with Umbridge. Sorry.”

Harry had to subdue the emerging feeling of being flattered when he heard this. He should not be feeling flattered from this, grateful maybe, but not flattered. “Thanks, Sorry I didn’t even see you.” He said warily at the blonde.

“I noticed, was she really that bad to have you basically running down the corridor?”

Harry considered this, whether he should tell Draco of what she was making him do. He had just decided it would be better not to alarm anyone and give her the satisfaction when he had absentmindedly ran his hand through his hair, causing a onward looking Draco to glance at his hand and see the words etched across.

“Harry, your hand?”

“Oh, it’s nothing just a scar from herbo- ”

Draco stepped forward and took Harry’s hand into his and examined it closely. He gazed at it for a full minute, before looking up at the raven head with an expression of absolute hatred on his face.

“That. Vile. Bitch.”

Harry took his hand back from Draco and looked away, unable to hold back misery in his voice. “Draco it’s fine hone-

“ITS NOT FINE!” Draco shouted at Harry, waving his hands in the air in frustration and causing the raven head to jump in shock at the sudden increase in volume. “Harry, that’s torture. Not even Snape would do that shit to you. You need to tell someone, like straight away.”

“No.” Harry said flatly. “If she finds out I’ve told someone she’s going to think she’s got to me. I won’t give her that satisfaction.”

“Harry!” Draco whispered loudly in an attempt to rectify his earlier outburst. He grabbed Harry by the arm and dragged him down the corridor. He opened up an empty classroom at the end of it and pulled him inside, spelling the door shut behind them with a flick of his wand. He turned back to Harry and looked intently at him, rage and worry spread across his face. “You need to not be so Gryffindor. It’s not admirable Harry, it’s plain stupid. What would you tell someone if they had been in that detention? To just suck it up and endure it because otherwise she wins?! What if it was a first year Harry, or Weasleys sister?”

All the words that came out of the blonde’s mouth hit home. Had it been anyone else, Harry would have convinced them to tell someone. Why didn’t Harry believe he deserved the same? Surely it was braver to know when to seek help, than to suffer in silence. He looked over at Draco, who was watching him carefully. He nodded at the blonde, who visibly relaxed.

“You’ll tell someone?”

“Yeah.” Harry said, sighing at him. “I’ll tell McGonagall in the morning after class.”

Draco smiled at him in response to hearing this. “Jeez Harry, there I thought I was going to have to threaten you with telling Snape. Glad you came to your senses quicker than I thought you would.”

The raven head looked down on the floor, trying to make sure the blonde didn’t see the potential glistening of tears in his eyes. “Yeah, Thanks Draco. I probably would have just taken it from her everyday otherwise.”

“Glad to help. But you know, McGonagall isn’t the only one you need to tell right?”

Harry looked up quickly. “Who else do you mean?” He hoped the blonde didn’t mean Dumbledore.

“Your friends Harry, Granger and Weasley. I’m pretty sure they’d want to know too.” Draco added after (having noticed Harry’s looking more visibly relaxed at the mention of his friends). “I know you don’t want to tell Dumbledore Harry, I’m sure McGonagall will do that for you. But you should at least tell your friends as well.”

While Harry didn’t want to agree to what Draco had said, he knew that now with them all being on speaking terms it was going to be a lot harder to keep it secret. So he nodded in agreement with the blonde. “I guess so, and I guess if we’re all going to be friends then you may as well tell Blaise and Pansy. It would be pretty hard to keep it hidden I suppose.” He said glumly.

Draco smiled at him. “Don’t worry, if I do tell them they won’t go spreading it round. And look.” He put his hand on Harry’s shoulder and stared straight into his eyes. “I’m here for you, as much as your other friends are. I’ll look to see if there’s anything we can do to get them sick words off your hand, don’t need that shit there.”

Harry insides squirmed in a way he didn’t recognise as laughed darkly. “Yeah, I already have one scar off a psycho, don’t need another.”

*

The next day, Harry had lightened to the plan of telling McGonagall and his friends. Draco had promised that he’ll be outside Transfiguration after class to see what she says and given that prospect he felt significantly better about it.

“That absolute cow!” Hermione hissed over breakfast as Harry confessed to his friends about the previous night. “How dare she even think that’s an acceptable way to punish you. No Harry I’m very glad you’re telling McGonagall, she’ll put a stop to it.”

Ron stared darkly at Harry’s hand, a look of intense displeasure spread across his face. “Maybe she’ll do us all a favour and just transfigure her into a toad and be done with it.”

“Yeah, but I don’t know how much power she’ll have against Umbridge, especially with Fudge in her corner.” Harry said, admitting the worry in his voice.

“Even with Fudge Harry, Dumbledore banned the use of torture for a reason. It’s why Filch is always so depressed over the fact he can’t hang up anyone anymore. No, if we’re lucky she’ll have her bags packed and be gone by the end of the day.” Hermione concluded.

While Harry hoped that what she said would come to fruition, he didn’t believe at all it would be that simple.

Transfiguration came and went quickly. Harry, who had been unable to revise last night had all but failed miserably at the renewed efforts to vanish away his snail. Hermione was very sympathetic however, telling Harry there was nothing to be worried about and that he’ll manage it soon. She was less sympathetic with Ron on the other hand, who had for some reason unbeknownst to the other two also been unable to vanish his snail. Hermione pursed her lips and questioned why he didn’t revise them last night. When he tried to tell her he had an early night she replied to this with a glare very reminiscent of his mother, which made him promise her that he’ll revise them tonight.

Once the class started to empty and the other two waited at the back of the class, Harry approached McGonagall’s desk.

“Professor?”

She looked up from writing something and stared at him. “Yes Potter?”

“It’s about my detention with Umbridge. I -”

“Mister Potter, If you’re going to try to ask if I can get you excused from it then I have some bad news for you.” She replied sharply.

“No professor, it’s… well… this.” He pulled his hand up and showed it to her.

Her reaction was faster than he expected. One moment she was sitting behind her desk and the next moment she was next to him examining his hand. She looked up at his face and stared through her square spectacles at him. “Is this- is this her doing Potter?”

He nodded.

She took her hand away from his and stared over him where the other two were.

“Miss Granger, close the door please.”

Hermione was about to close the door when a figure shot through it followed by two others. Blaise marched dramatically through the door quickly with a out of breath and seemingly embarrassed Pansy and Draco, who mouthed a quick apology at Hermione for nearly being dislodged from the ground.

“Blood quills are illegal!” Blaise half-shouted to an expressionless McGonagall. Harry had to admit, he must be either brave to shout at Professor McGonagall of all people, or incredibly insane. “They were banned years ago, one of my mother’s husbands wrote the law on it!”

McGonagall gave Harry a quick look, who tried his best to explain nonverbally about the events of the last few days. She then turned to Hermione. To his utter surprise, she acted completely unfazed by the intrusion.

“Miss Granger, the door if you please.”

Once the door was shut, she turned to Blaise. “Mister Zabini, I am well aware of the law. Please take a seat. For that matter all of you take a seat.” She pointed her wand at her biscuit tin, and its lid came off as it levitated over to him. “Have a biscuit, I daresay you need it more than Mister Potter.” She smiled slightly at Harry and turned back to face him. “Thankyou Harry for drawing this to my attention. Had I known about her preferred choice of detention beforehand I’d have had a different opinion on the matter of whether you would have to attend.

Harry’s heart lifted. “So I don’t have to go back?”

“Heavens no. Allow one of my students to have their hand cut open? I’d more likely give up Transfiguration and become apprentice to Sybill. No, in lieu of this… situation, were you supposed to have detention with her, you will instead come to my office, where you can use your time to catch up on any work you are falling behind on.” She turned towards the others. “I will permit Mr Weasley and Mr Malfoy to accompany you, should they wish. I believe you two could do with the practise at least in my subject.”

They all stared at her, disbelieving what she had just said.

“You may think news travels fast between you students, but allow me to tell you that news travels even faster between us teachers. Your sudden friendship has not gone unnoticed.” She moved back to behind her desk and sat down, looking at both Harry and Draco. “I had to offer Madam Pince a strong drink yesterday when she told me how you two had been friendly towards eachother in the library, although I believe she was more concerned that people still think its appropriate to laugh in there than anything else.” She sighed slightly before continuing. “Professor Dumbledore has always been an advocate for inter-house friendship, and this-” She pointed at them all “-might be exactly what we need now. So yes. If you so wish you may accompany Mister Potter to my office for the week. I will be in there of course, I don’t want to leave you alone in case Delores decides she can admit herself into my office.”

There was silence for a moment, then Blaise spoke up. “Has anybody told you how amazing you are professor McGonagall?” He said in an overly complimentary manner, no doubt a light attempt to be involved in the proceeding. Draco just put his hand on his temple and starting messaging his head while Pansy pretended she was checking through her bag.

“However.” McGonagall continued, ignoring Blaise’s comment, although Harry was sure he saw a small smile upon her lips. “As we have noticed, it will no doubt soon be noticed by Delores herself. Which means that you will have to act diligently. I cannot defend you all as much as I would like, and she will make life hard for us all if we’re not careful.”

They all nodded in agreement.

“You may go now, and don’t worry Potter.” She gave him a sincere look. “I will not keep you past midnight.”

As they were about to leave Harry had a sudden thought of realisation, and decided he may as well chance it. He was told to be brave, best to just grab it by the horns. “Professor?”

“Yes Mister Potter.”

“If I’m spending my detentions with you, do you think I’d be able to have Friday off for Quidditch practise?”

She looked at him carefully, before smiling. “Yes I expect so. If not just to displease Delores, I also want to retain the cup. I have gotten quite fond of having both the Quidditch and the end of house cup in my office, I would hate to allow them to leave. But as it is still technically your detention time, forgive me if I decide to spend it in the grounds… overseeing you. And I’ll have to tell Miss Johnson about the current change of circumstances.”

Harry grinned at her. “Thanks Professor!”

*

Overjoyed at the turn of events the still unlikely six spent the morning together during Care of magical Creatures. Like McGonagall had foreshadowed, news had spread of the unlikely alliance and they were subjected to stares from the other houses as they made their way to class. However none of this bothered them as they moved together, they were too busy slating Umbridge to notice much. Draco had explained to due to his theatrical self, (“Honestly Draco, you talk as if you expected anything else from me.” Blaise drawled.) when he had told Blaise in the morning about Harry’s hand the boy called Umbridge a word that had never left his lips before, then insisted they all go down there to see the raven head. Pansy added that she nearly cursed him when he barged into her room demanding that she hurry up. Hermione shocked them all when Harry conferred that it was Draco who convinced him to tell someone, as upon hearing this she very nearly jumped on the blonde to hug him and thank him for ‘reminding Harry he doesn’t have to do this alone’. Draco was pleased, if not a bit shaken at the attempted pounce. She insisted he start calling her by her first name, which he was hesitant about at first but slowly got around to the idea. While Ron had been incredibly happy about everything he was still referring to them by their surname, something which Blaise chided him for playfully. He warned Ron that by the end of the week he’d have him screaming the boy’s first name at the top of his lungs, and winked devilishly at him. This caused Ron to go bright red to match his hair, and Draco muttered something about inappropriate implications.

Once the two groups went in their separate ways (the Slytherins had Charms), the three Gryffindors decided to spend some time in the common room working on their essays. Once they had sat down at their favourite seats by the fireplace, Angelina Johnson came over to Harry.

“Potter, I ugh-” she paused to look at him apprehensively while fiddling with her braids “- I want to apologise for shouting at you yesterday. McGonagall told me about what happened last night. God that Umbridge woman is awful.”

“It’s fine.” Harry responded truthfully. “You were just angry about Friday, but now I still get to come to the keeper tryouts.”

She grinned at his forgiveness. “Yeah, I was so happy when she told me. Even if she’ll be there, I hope it doesn’t unnerve any new recruits too much.” (Ron gave a small cough that nobody noticed).

She was about to make her leave when she added in an undertone. “So I heard you’ve made friends with some Slytherins, Malfoy included. I hope you still plan on thrashing them during our first game?”

“Yeah!” Harry said, glad that Angelina’s concern over their new friendship only regarded quidditch.

“Great.” She beamed at him. “After not being able to play all last year, I’m really looking forward to making sure we show everyone who’s the best team. I think Oliver would have my head if I let us lose the championship after only having it for one year.”

“Have you heard from him much?” Hermione piped up.

“Only occasionally, he congratulated me when I told him I was captain, and made me promise to try my damn hardest” - she laughed lightly - “ he told me he’s still only on the reserves team for Puddlemere, but he’s hoping to make the full team since the keeper is retiring this year… too many bludgers to the head. Anyway I got Newts to study for, I’ll catch you later.” She waved as she walked off to her dormitory.

*

The rest of the day went by smoothly, albeit for the fact they were given a new mountain of homework by Professor Sinistra, which including an essay detailing all the properties of Jupiter’s moons. After a well earnt dinner where Harry scoffed down several helpings of treacle tart, they walked over to the Transfiguration office so Hermione could see them off. She told them she’ll wait up for them, and in the meanwhile she can continue knitting some more clothes for the elves. As Ron tried to hold himself from saying anything, Harry was pleased the moment was interrupted by the arrival of Draco. Once she had left the three knocked on the office door and entered upon McGonagall’s response.

During the time they had, they set out to master the vanishing spells they had so dismally failed to produce the earlier morning. As it turned out Draco too struggled with the spell and much to his chagrin McGonagall looked up from her writing at her desk to tell them that Mister Malfoy had been showing a unusual lack of concentration this year that she would usually expect from Mister Crabbe or Goyle. Aside from this, the three boys showed clear improvement as the night went on. They were quite enjoying themselves, watching as lone snail shells floated slowly on the table. This was until there was an abrupt knock on the door followed immediately by the door being pushed open.

“Hello Delores.” McGonagall said coolly without looking up from her desk.

Umbridge looked around the office, a look of slight anger on her face that she tried to cover up. Upon noticing that Harry was sitting at a table with Ron and Draco her eyes bulged with raged and she replied in a faux-sweet voice. “Mister Potter is supposed to be in detention with me, Minerva.”

“I’m aware.” Still looking down at what she was writing, she continued. “But I thought it would be more useful for him to be with me, you see he needs to practise for vanishing spells, I can’t have one of my best students fall behind at such an imperative stage in his life.” Harry’s heart swelled at being called one of her best students.

The woman dressed in a disgusting shade of pink just glared at the other with her temper rising. “Mister Potter is supposed to be writing lines with me. Not practising vanishing spells. And especially not” – she pointed at the other two boys – “while he is in presence of his friends. He should not be enjoying his punishment.”

At this, McGonagall finally looked up and stared at Umbridge with a fierce glare. “Mister Potter will not be taking anymore detentions with you, Delores.”

“And why is that, Minerva?” She asked in her most dangerously sweet voice.

“I would think the answer is obvious. Cutting open an innocent boy’s hand is beyond my comprehension of common human indecency. If you think that is an appropriate punishment, you are very mistaken.” She replied in an equally dangerous voice.

“Are you questioning my methods on how to deal with rulebreakers that see fit to tell nasty lies?”

“Of course not, Delores. There is nothing to question concerning your draconic use of blood quills. Should you think I am questioning your methods, maybe you ought not to be the one teaching?”

Umbridge shot daggers at the woman. “You are treading a very thin line Minerva. It is obvious your loyalties are with Dumbledore and this boy’s nasty lies that transpired last year.”

“You are right that I am loyal to the headmaster of this school. I would expect it would be obvious to a child where my loyalties lay. Just as much as it is obvious your loyalties are with the minister.” She snapped back savagely. “If that is all Delores, I’d quite like to get back to my work, and I’m sure you have your own work to do.”

“I do indeed. This won’t be the end of this, Minerva. Potter will have his detention.” She seethed and turned on her heel and left, slamming the door shut behind her. Once she had gone, McGonagall turned back to her writing.

“You’re bloody brilliant Professor.” Ron said in awe.

“Thankyou Mister Weasley, now do continue on your vanishing spells, I’d like to move on to mice in the next class.”

*

Friday came around quicker than expected. While it was starting to become old news concerning Harry’s new friends, there had been no sudden outbreak of gossip regarding his detentions being taken over by McGonagall. It seemed that Umbridge had not wanted anyone to know her authority had been stepped on, so for the moment everyone was blissfully unaware that he had spent his evenings in the transfiguration office catching up (and for once, managing to stay on top) on homework. Ron had only attended the night Umbridge came in, and when Harry had tried to ask him what he was doing instead he attempted to avoided the question. Harry didn’t mind however, as spending the evenings with Draco was interesting enough. They both managed to excel in vanishing spells and had been able to vanish their mice on the first day of being tasked with it. McGonagall had also been pretty lax with them talking to each other while in her office, and allowed them to snack on the biscuits from her tin. Umbridge had not tried to interrupt them anytime throughout the week, but Harry had a sneaking suspicion she was watching him thoroughly around the castle. What had came as a surprise was when Ron had pulled Harry aside on the morning to tell him he’d be trying out for the role of keeper. The Raven head was thrilled at the prospect to have his best mate on the team, so he slapped him on the back in approval and vowed to have his fingers crossed for him.

McGonagall had told Harry that she changed her mind about attending the practise, as she had seen how much he had got through the last few days so decided that he could ‘have the Friday off’. She also said he could make his own way to the pitch, (“I trust, Mister Potter that you won’t go galivanting into the forbidden forest”) so after a quick dinner, him and Hermione walked down to the pitch to find Ron and everyone else. Once they got down there, they found the rest of the Quidditch team had already arrived along with a bunch of potentials. Harry spotted Ron looking nervous and slightly pale by Fred and George.

“So ickle Ronniekins wants to play with the big boys now does he?” Fred playfully asked his brother.

“Shut up.”

“Now now, just cause you’re a prefect doesn’t mean you can boss us around. You’ll have to take orders from us if you want our approval.” George retorted, looking devilish.

Ron spotted his friend walking over and beckoned him to come quicker. “Harry, tell these idiots to leave me alone.” He implored.

Harry Grinned. “You’ll be fine Ron, just keep your eye on the Quaffle when you’re up there.”

“Have you actually done any flying recently?” George asked looking serious.

“Ugh-” his sight dropped down to the floor in apparent embarrassment. “-I’ve be-been going out in the evenings to practise.” He tried hard not to look up.

Before Fred and George could make a degrading comment, Hermione reached over to him and kissed him on the cheek, causing him to slightly jump from the shock and go intensely bright red.

“I know you’ll be great Ron.” Hermione said to him happily. She glanced over to see Angelina getting ready to blow her whistle. “I’ll be over in the stands rooting for you!” She squeezed his shoulder and walked off over to find somewhere to sit. Ron was absentmindedly touching where she had kissed him.

“What the hell just happened?” Fred asked George.

“Think prefect duties must be making her lose it. Or maybe she nibbled one of the fainting fancies by mistake… Come on Freddie -” He started to drag his twin “- don’t want to keep the queen waiting.”

Ron looked up at Harry and whispered, a slow grin spreading on his face. “She kissed me on the cheek.” It wasn’t a question, more a statement. The raven head just laughed at him.

“Yeah, come on. Let’s go get you that keeper position!” He dragged his best mate over to where Angelina had just blew the whistle beckoning everyone to come over.

*

A couple hours later, the Gryffindor party returned to the common room, quidditch team at the front, Ron as their new keeper. Whatever reason he had had to have been nervous earlier had proved to be nothing, for the boy had managed to stop every Quaffle from reaching the goalposts. He had also managed to avoid several of the Bludgers that the twins had been ordered to send at him to test his reflexes, and a few extra they had sent for the fun of it. Harry strongly believed that Ron’s performance was due Hermione, but he wasn’t going to tease him about it… yet. As they all chilled around the common room drinking butterbeer while the chasers tried to fit Ron into Wood’s old uniform, Harry sat and watched by the fireplace with Hermione.

“He really did well didn’t he?” Hermione asked as she watched them try to squeeze his head through, unsuccessfully.

“Yeah, although I do think a certain someone had something to do with it.” Harry said playfully. Hermione’s cheeked suddenly reddened.

“Well I-I ugh- I-I thought that we-well… I didn’t want Fred and George to make him feel uncomfortable!” Stuttering out indignantly, she looked expectedly towards Harry who laughed.

“Hermione relax. It obviously worked. But if anything happens you may have to do something similar to make sure he plays like he did earlier.” Harry teased at her.

She had opened her mouth to respond but was quickly interrupted by Harry yelling out in pain slightly and jumped his hand up to his scar. At the same time, he had a most peculiar sensation around his midriff. As if he was happy something unfortunate was happening to someone else.

Hermione looked around to make sure nobody had noticed and leaned into Harry. “is it your scar?”

He nodded as he rubbed his head while squinting his eyes. “I think he’s happy, definitely happy at something.”

She looked at him gravely. “You need to go to Dumbledore and tell him.”

“No, there’s no point if it happens so often.” He said flatly. Hermione seemed to know why he didn’t want to go to him, so she avoided continuing that point.

“Well.” She thought for a moment before her eyes lifted back to look at Harry. “Maybe you should tell snuffles. But only if you can conceal it in a letter well enough.”

Nodding, Harry agreed to write a letter to him in the morning. Both of them knew that it would be dangerous but as long as he was careful he shouldn’t arouse any suspicion. Harry was still allowed to send and receive letters. For now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So the kiss may have been click bait... but I mean it did change everything! Ron can only perform amazingly when there is a girl, so who better then his no doubt future wifey!
> 
> Also next chapter should be a lot of fun... the party chapter. But then I think it's going to get dark for a while. I need it to be less fluff and more angst. I'm trying to convey real magical life here when one moment everyone is all happy, then the next people are crying in the corner.
> 
> Any constructive criticism will be appreciated!  
> Thank you so much for reading!! :D


	3. Dungbombs, Dobby and Draco

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry enjoys several chats with people (and elves), and people get slightly drunk

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for taking so long (four days is long right? RIGHT?)
> 
> Also, hopefully this won't be too long... I'm always afraid a chapter will be too long and people will lose interest.  
> I seem to be plagued by some glitch (i assume) where all my end notes appear on the last update (of course this will be my third update so i may be wrong) so I can't say what I want to say incase of spoilers...
> 
> However... this chapter will be quite a nice one, but don't expect the happiness to continue... I think Umbridge is preparing her revenge.  
> ENJOY! :D

Walking down a large windowless corridor that seemed to stretch on forever, making a turn every now and then. What was he looking for? Harry didn’t know, but he was determined to find it. There was excitement, anticipation, longing for whatever it is he was searching for. He had to have it. One more turn, then another, then down a corridor, then another turn. He started walking down a long stretch of corridor now, his footsteps echoing in the silence. But nobody else was here, he was alone. Eventually he saw it, a door. A big looming black door at the end of the corridor. He had to reach it, he was speeding up, he had to get there before…But the door wasn’t getting in any closer, the more he walked towards it the further it went away. He broke out in a run, sure that if anybody was nearby they would hear him. But then before he could get there he saw something. Grey eyes on a pale face, sparkling in moonlight that didn’t really belong there. He couldn’t work out who they were. They were watching him, warning him not to go any further. Begging almost. The eyes looked familiar, but he couldn’t think who they belonged to, but he longed for them as much as the door at the end of the corridor. He was stuck between the two. He thought about reaching out, finding out who the eyes belonged to. But when he tried, they looked at him pleadingly. Scared, worried about rejection. He looked back towards the door, but it had gone. There was something else, someone else, in it’s place. It was walking towards Harry, striding towards him. They were wearing a cloak. They lifted their hand. They pointed their wand at him. A cold laugh. A sound from the grey eyes watching him, pleading for Harry to run. Too late, the figure screamed, and a flash of green light hit Harry.

Harry had been the first to wake up the following morning. Sunlight was barely shining through when he decided to get ready and make his way to the Owlery. Letter in hand that he had written the following night, he walked casually up towards the tower. On his way there he had crossed paths with Nearly Headless Nick and a disgruntled looking Mrs. Norris which he resisted the urge to give a well needed kick. Once in the owlery, he spotted his faithful snowy Hedwig who immediately flew down to meet him.

“The letter says its for snuffles, but its for Sirius okay?” He whispered while stroking her feathers. He wasn’t sure why he had to whisper to his owl but there was an unsure feeling in the back of his mind that was warning him. Once the owl nibbled the side of his ear affectionally to show she understood, he placed the latter in her beak and walked her over to the window. “Safe flight then.” He said as she stretched her wings wide and flew off into the sky. He watched her go hoping to have a letter back from Sirius within a few days sharing his insight on Harry’s problems. He had just turned around and was debating whether to go back to the common room or straight to breakfast when the door opened to show Cho Chang looking mildly distressed holding a package in her hands.

“Hi.” Harry said automatically.

“Oh!” Cho exclaimed. “I didn’t realise anyone else would be up here this early… it’s my mum’s birthday, I completely forgot… I had to rush through my trunk and wrap it.” She held up the hastily wrapped parcel.

“Right.” Harry said, brain seemingly jammed. “What did you get for her?”

“Just a music box… it self-enchants to play music according to your mood. I got it in Hogsmeade last year with…” She stopped speaking and turned to look around for a suitable owl.

Harry’s insides squirmed. She had meant to say Cedric but stopped short. The raven head knew they had been dating last year but he never stopped to think how much his death must have affected her as well.

“Nice weather we’re having.” He said awkwardly to avoid the silence.

“Oh yes.” She said, her voice unnaturally high while she was still looking at owls. “Great condition for quidditch. I heard Gryffindor got a new seeker right??”

“Ugh- yeah. It’s my friend Ron, d’you know him?”

“The tornados-hater?” She turned scowling. “Is he any good?”

“Yeah. I saw him play he was pretty good.” Harry looked out the window towards the pitch. “I almost didn’t get to play.”

“That Umbridge woman is foul.” She said darkly. “Putting you in detention because you told the truth about… about him.” She turned away again quickly, coaxing a barn own down to her.

Harry looked at the floor. “At-atleast she only managed to give me one day. McGonagall intervened.”

“That’s good.” She said as she attached the parcel onto the owl’s leg. Once she was done she walked with the owl over to the window. She turned around and looked at him closely. “You not scared she will do something about it?”

“I mean.” Harry thought for a moment. “I am a bit I suppose. But there’s not much she can do right?”

Cho bit her lip, frowning. “I dunno, my friend’s mum works for the ministry. She told her not to get in the way of Umbridge, cause she’s planning on something. But my friend didn’t know what.”

“Oh, well I guess I’ll just have wait and see.” He said shrugging, trying not to look too disconcerted.

“Yeah…” Her voice trailed off. “So I heard about you an-”

She didn’t get to finish her sentence, because suddenly there was a loud bang as the door pushed open and slammed against the wall. Standing there acting triumphant was a wheezy looking Filch, scarf wrapped around his neck and his nose red from what appeared to be the flu. Trotting at his heels was Mrs. Norris, who eyed Harry disdainfully (if cats can even do that, Harry thought) before gazing up over at the owls, mewing hungrily.

“AHA!” Filch said, manic glint in his eye and pointing at Harry. “I’ve got a anonymous tip-off saying you were about to place a massive order for dungbombs!”

“Says who?” Harry said folding his arms.

“None of your business. Now hand over whatever you were about to send.” He hissed back.

“I can’t. It’s gone.”

“Gone?” Filch’s eyes bulging dangerously.

“Yes gone.” Harry replied calmly.

Filch walked straight up to Harry and almost sniffed him. He said angrily. “How do I know you don’t have them in your pockets.”

“I saw him send it.” Cho said quickly.

Filch rounded on her, looking at her as if he didn’t realise she was there. “You saw him-”

“-Yes, I saw him.” She replied fiercely.

Filch’s skin colour turned into a shade of deep purple, reminiscent of Uncle Vernon. He turned back to Harry and deliberately sniffed him, in an apparent attempt to smell guilt. “If I get so much as a whiff of a dungbomb. I’ll make sure you never have anywhere to be safe from me.”

 

Once Filch had stormed out Harry and Cho briefly chatted for a while as they made their way down the tower. Joking at the idea of Filch stalking the raven head while he was in the loo, they planned to meet sometime to catch up. Although unrealising, they had both unconsciously figured that aside from Cedric’s parents, they may have been the two most affected people from his death. Cho had undoubtedly strong feelings for him as they were dating and Harry was witness to his death which hardly anybody believed thanks to the ministry.

After Harry left Cho he made his way to breakfast. Spotting Ron and Hermione, he walked over and sat next by them.

“So, sent the letter?” Ron asked as he speared a fat sausage on his fork, obviously informed by Hermione.

“Yeah, you wouldn’t believe what happened while I was there.” He relayed the conversation he had with Cho and the follow-up occurrence between him and Filch.

Ron looked completely unfazed by the situation, although giving Filch a slight insult (“He’s crazy, he’s got a fetish for finding rule-breakers that one. Hate to think what he’d be like if he could use the whip” He said wisely.) Hermione however looked perturbed from the story.

“What?” Harry asked.

She looked anxious. “Don’t you think it’s odd that you went to send a letter and Filch got (she air-quoted) _anonymous tip-off_.”

“I don’t know.” Harry said slowly, until it was suddenly dawning on him. “You don’t think?”

Hermione nodded. “Yeah.”

Ron, who had half a piece of toast hanging by his mouth looked from one friend to another. “Am I missing something?”

“Umbridge.” The other two both said together.

“I bloody well don’t miss her.” He said confused.

Hermione tutted. “No Ronald. It could have been Umbridge that was the tip-off.”

“Why? She doesn’t honestly think Harry wanted dungbombs did she?”

Hermione sighed before continuing. “No, but what if she only said that to get access to Harry’s letter.”

“Why would she want his letter.”

“Think who he was sending it to Ronald.” She said impatiently.

Ron thought for a moment. “You don’t think she knows about… snuffles, right?”

“I wouldn’t put it past the ministry to have made the connection that Harry thought Sirius was innocent with him managing to escape again.” She said sadly. “What’s also worrying is what Cho said about her friend. What could Umbridge be planning?”

“Maybe she wants revenge for McGonagall stopping her detentions, remember what she said?” Ron coughed and held himself up to put a mock Umbridge voice on. “ ‘This won’t be the end of this, Minerva. Potter will have his detention.’ She might try to snuff out McGonagall so nobody can stop her!” He said gasping.

Hermione rolled her eyes. “I don’t think she’d resort to murder Ron. She works for the ministry there’s plenty of _legal_ things she can do at Hogwarts. And also.” She looked unsettled. “I doubt it would just be to make Harry have detention.”

“What else could she do?” Harry asked not looking forward to the answer.

“All the stuff she said in her speech at the start of term. If she really wants to interfere with Hogwarts… she’s going to need a lot more power. And luckily she knows the right man to give it her.”

“Fudge.” Harry and Ron said darkly.

“Fudge.” Hermione agreed, nodding.

*

Despite the worry that Umbridge was about to start a crusade against Hogwarts, the concern the trio had fell short by the middle of the day. They had unusually managed to keep up with all their homework for the week so was at a loss what to do for the day. Apart from quidditch practise that Harry and Ron had later they had plans to meet with the Slytherin in the evening, but as it was only still morning they had quite a few hours left to pass by. Finally they settled on visiting Dobby down in the kitchens and although all three of them were making their way Hermione had somehow managed to overhear some second year Gryffindor’s whispering together about ‘ _trials in the common room’_. Knowing all too well that this was the work of Fred and George, Hermione rushed off without a second thought to intervene in any rule-breaking the twins were committing. Setting off alone after watching her run off (It’s amazing she was even able to hear them, they were three feet away and whispering!” Ron said disbelievingly) they soon made their way to the entrance of the kitchens. Once tickling the pear in the portrait, they were soon flocked by happy elves bowing to them as they stepped through.

“Harry Potter sir!” Shouted an eager Dobby, running towards the raven head. “How are you sir?”

“I’m fine Dobby, I ju- wait. Dobby, have you been taking Hermione’s hats?” For as Harry looked at him, his head seemed to be piled under a mountain of brightly coloured headpieces.

“Oh yes Harry Potter sir! Dobby has been taking all the hats!”

Ron, who had been busy being served (and tasting) numerous cakes by all the elves turned towards Dobby. “Does that mean nobody else has been taking then?”

“No Sir, they is not sir. They is feeling insulted at the disrespect of it.” Dobby said shyly while several of the other elves nearby began nodding at what Dobby was saying even while looking at him reproachfully. “There is talk that they will not be cleaning the common room sir!”

“Then who will clean it?” Ron said sounding worried.

“Don’t worry sir! Dobby can clean it all by himself! Maybe Winky as well if she is feeling up for it!”

“How is Winky, Dobby?” Harry asked, trying to change the subject because as he glanced around the faces of the elves were beginning to seem more mutinous the more the common room was mentioned.

“Ahh.” Dobby said, eyes drooping and looking sad. “Winky is not doing well at all sir. She is still in shock at her old masters. When she hear about Mr Crouch’s son receiving the -” he gulped “- the dementors kiss. Winky cried and cried and hugged the bottle sir!”

All the house-elves turned away in shame, probably to make sure they weren’t associated with the likes of Winky. Harry felt sorry for the poor elf. Barty Crouch may had tried to kill him, but in Harry’s opinion he didn’t deserve the kiss. Nobody deserved that (although Umbridge had crossed his mind).

“Where is Winky?” Ron said looking around.

“She is sleeping sir.” Dobby replied at once. “she drank a whole bottle yesterday and couldn’t stand sir! So Dobby is making sure she sleeps it off. Tis been over a whole year since Winky has been here sir, but she is not happy at that sir. Not at all.”

 

Harry and Ron nonetheless enjoyed a nice catch-up with Dobby. The house-elf explained about how he had spent the summer cleaning up Hogwarts and deciding what to do with the money he had earnt from working there. He chose to use his money to go on a little trip with Winky somewhere nice for a few days. Eventually he settled on a beach by Cornwall, and although the other elf was reluctant to go with him she eventually conceded. Dobby told them how they received strange looks from the wizards that saw them, and some even came up to ask where their master was. All in all, Harry was glad that Dobby was finally getting some happiness in life after spending most of it being abused by Lucius Malfoy. That was when a sudden thought occurred to him.

“Dobby…” Harry said slowly. “What was Draco Malfoy like?”

The house-elf’s eyes widened and looked at the boy in surprise. “Sir is wanting to know about Mister Draco Malfoy?”

“Yeah, just- I’m friends with him now. And I’m just curious to know what he was like.”

Ron rolled his eyes.

“Dobby does not really know what to say, sorry Harry Potter sir.”

“Well, how did he act at home, or treat you, or his relationship with his parents?”

Dobby concentrated for a moment before speaking. “Mister Draco Malfoy mostly spent time to himself in the manor, Harry Potter sir. He was not mean to the house-elves. Only-” He gulped, holding down the urge to punish himself. “-Lord Malfoy hurt us sir. But his son had a good relationship with them sir! Even though he argued with his father a lot. He was also lonely sir.”

Harry looked in surprise. “Lonely? What do you mean by that Dobby?”

“Well…” Dobby began slowly. “Young Mister Malfoy was a lonely child in a big house sir. He had friends come over a bit sir but… He always seemed like was missing something sir. He spent a lot of time in his room sir, not wanting to be disturbed by anyone. But then sometimes he would go out into the ground. But whenever Dobby saw him there he was not doing anything, just staring out sir.”

“And didn’t his parents worry for him?” Harry asked disbelieving what he was hearing.

“His mother was always worried sir. She would sometimes make the house-elves follow him to make sure he was alright sir. But Master Malfoy did not worry much sir. Dobby would often hear him telling his wife that she was being coddling him too much. Dobby thinks he was wrong to say that!” His eyes widened in surprise at saying that and managing to supress the urge to smack himself over the head.

Harry was in utter disbelief. He had never considered that Draco would ever feel lonely. He always seemed to act like he had everything he always wanted, friends at beck and call included. It sounded like Draco often felt estranged towards his parents, something Harry could relate to with his Aunt and Uncle. The raven head couldn’t help but feel sorry for the blonde, imagining him in a giant house with hardly anyone to talk to except his parents or the elves most the time. A deep inner part of Harry just wanted to hug him right now. But that could wait till later (if it came later, what was Harry thinking wanting to hug Draco Malfoy he thought.) when they all got together.

“Thanks Dobby, sorry I asked, I was just curious.” He said smiling at the elf.

“Oh no Harry Potter sir! Dobby is always happy to help in whatever he can for you sir! Dobby hopes you and young Mister Malfoy will become good friends’ sir!” But then Dobby’s facial expression turned to be worried. “Just don’t replace your wheezy!”

Ron and Harry laughed. “Don’t worry Dobby, nobody could replace my wheezy.” He grinned.

 

Once they decided to leave Dobby made them promise that they’ll return to see him soon. After assuring him they’ll visit whenever they next have free time they began to slowly make their way to the common room to find Hermione whose absence did not remain unnoticed.

“Do you think we’ll get in there and find the mangled remains of my brothers?”

“Maybe. Or she might have force-fed them their entire load of sweets.” Harry replied amused at the thoughts.

“That reminds me, we going to tell her about Dobby taking all the clothes?”

“Do you want your manged remains in the common room too?” The raven head laughed. “No, I think we’ll just miss that part out.”

Ron nodded. “Good thinking, she might try and start throwing them into the kitchens if she found out.” He added faux-darkly. “Dunno what she’s thinking trying to free all the elves. What happens if poor Dobby has to clean our common room all by himself! Or if they start sending up sub-standard food at dinner!” He looked at Harry in horror at the mere thought of not having good food to eat.

“You know she won’t give up with this right?”

“Yeah.” Ron said laughing. “Not until there’s a house-elf standing as the Minister for magic.

“Probably be a damn load better than the current one.”

“Five points from Gryffindor, Mister Potter.” A girly voice spoke behind him.

Harry and Ron whirled around. Standing there looking smug was Umbridge, cladded in a pink cardigan with matching bowtie on top of her head.

“What for?” Harry demanded at her.

“Speaking ill of our Minister Mister Potter.” She said, mouth widening in a cruel smile.

“So we can’t even have our own opinion then?” Ron said in disbelief.

She rounded on him. “It would be interesting if the Minister learnt of what one of his employee’s son thought of him, don’t you think? It’s a good thing some of your family are loyal to the right people.” Smile widening even more as she hit the jackpot.

Ron stayed silent and just stared at her in disgust. Harry nudged him on the side. “Let’s go.” He said, pulling him around.

“You ought to be careful Mister Potter.” Umbridge said as they walked away. “Things will only get harder for you if you keep spreading nasty little _black_ lies.”

Harry’s hand gripped his friends arm tightly as she empathized on the end of her sentence. Determined not to give her an excuse he made sure to trek all the way back to the common room without looking back and not uttering a word, only letting go of Ron’s arm once he was sure neither of them would try to retaliate. Ron didn’t object towards the silence, he had a look of pure hatred on his face that matched exactly how Harry was feeling. Once they got to the portrait of the fat lady, the muttered the password and stepped into the common room.

“There you are!” Hermione said shrilly as she walked over. “I’m so sorry. I got caught up watching the twins! You know, the-” She stopped as she saw the looks on their faces. “-What happened to you two?”

“Umbridge.” They said in unison.

The explanation was brief, Harry mostly spoke. Ron still looked like he wanted to reach his hands around Umbridge’s stubby little neck and throttle her. Once they were done, Hermione just looked at both of them thoughtfully.

“I guess it settles it then.” She said glumly.

“What?” Harry asked.

“I’m almost sure it must have been her who got Filch to try and get your letter. And she was just conveniently nearby you when you were coming back here? I hope she doesn’t have anyone else in the school to follow us around.” She gave a glance towards Ron. “You okay?”

Ron looked up, rage still in his face. “The bitch threatened to have my dad sacked.”

Hermione acted cautious. “Do you think she’d actually do that though?”

The boy shrugged as he stared off into space. “Who knows what that woman would do. If she got my dad fired… and it would be my fault an-“ He was interrupted by a light slap to the arm from Hermione.

“It would not be your fault Ronald!” She said angrily at the thought. “Just because she is so far up Fudge’s rear-end does not mean she can behave like she runs the school! She does not.”

“Not yet.” Ron said darkly. Harry couldn’t help but agree at the uncertainty.

“Oh I’d like to see her try.” Hermione said savagely. “She could get Dumbledore removed but she’d have to face the wrath of every student, teacher, ghost and peeves.”

“At least it would be a good distraction from our OWLS I suppose.” Ron replied gruffly.

Hermione laughed manically. “Oh no. I don’t care if she declares herself the new empress of the wizarding world. Nobody-” She stared at them with a psychotic expression, sounding more unhinged the further she went on. “- is going. To stop me. Taking my OWLS.” She looked at them, almost daring them to say someone would object.

They all burst out laughing at Hermione’s zealous behaviour towards her education. Although knowing full well she was deadly serious and she’d likely hex anyone in her way towards her OWLS it was funny nonetheless funny. Once they had all calmed down she continued.

“So how was the kitchen?”

They explained to her all the conversation they had with Dobby, conveniently missing out anything to do with him taking all the knitted clothing. She didn’t seem to notice and just listened. When they told her that Dobby had spent his money on going to the beach she was ecstatic (“Oh I just knew he would do something like that! Good for him! Now all the other house-elves will see how happy he is being able to go on holiday and they’ll want to as well!”). However Once they mentioned Winky to her she seemed to act like she was in mourning.

“Well even if he was an awful man for firing her, she did love him.”

“I suppose.” Harry said agreeing. His eyes wandered off to Fred and George in a corner talking. “So how come you was stuck in here then? What was the twins doing?”

“Oh. Well.” Hermione poised herself ready to tell the story. “When I got here, I immediately went to apprehend them. But they told me that I’d like to see what they were developing so I-” She breathed in and closed her eyes. “- gave them the benefit of the doubt. They led me over to two second years, one of which was wearing a weird hat. The other pointed his wand at him and sent sparks over. But they never reached him.”

“What happened?” Harry and Ron said in interest.

“Well the sparks got deflected.” She said with a small smile on her face. “Turns out one of the things they’re trying to invest are self-defence clothing. Nothing that could stop something like the killing curse. But minor things. It’s actually a really good piece of magic.”

“And that.” A voice behind them said. “Is the nicest thing you’ve ever said about us Hermione.” The twins appeared grinning.

“What made you think of making that then?” Ron asked them both.

“Well my dear brother. In times like this, you can never be sure who to trust.” One twin said wisely.

“And also, we’ll earn loads from advertising them as duelling hats for kids that deflect spells off them!” The other twin said devilishly grinning.

Hermione’s face faltered a bit, she had to close her eyes for a second again. “Well, even if your main audience are kids. It is an impressive bit of magic. I’m sure there are loads of witches and wizards who can’t even produce a shield charm.

“Yep” They both said. Fred continued. “It’s a tough bit of magic to master, so we thought we’d do it for them.”

“And charge a nice fee in exchange.” George added in.

“So.” Fred started to say slowly. “A little bird told me you three are making nice with the Slytherins.”

“So?” Ron replied in a brash manner.

“Nothing little brother.” George replied to him eyebrows raised. “You’re a big likkle prefect now Ronniekins. We can’t stop you making friends with whoever you want.

“Plus.” Fred started. “We know you’re seeing Blaise, he’s one of the good ones.”

“You know him?” Hermione said in disbelief.

“Sure.” He said. “Great chap, Blaise. Bit eccentric though.”

“Bit flirty too.” George nodded.

“He’s a good laugh.”

“He did once ask to have us both at the same time though.” They both grinned.

Hermione just looked at them both in shock. Ron however nearly yelped. “And did you?!”

The twins both gave each other a sly look before turning to Ron. “Ask us no questions and we’ll tell you no lies little brother.”

“Just remember, he likes beautiful things.”

“And we’re beautiful.”

The trio just stared at this revelation from the twins. They laughed at the looks before turning to Harry. “Come on Harry, quidditch practise is soon we need to get there before Johnson flays us.”

“Hey!” Ron said indignantly. “I’m in the team too now!”

“Oh.” Fred said. “We forgot.” George ended.

*

Hours later, the three were under the invisibility cloak walking slowly down one of the dungeon corridors to the entrance. Although they had barely managed to all fit under the cloak, they decided to huddle under it nearly the moment they got out of their own common room just in case Umbridge had anyone watching them. Although the map said she herself was one again safely (and still alive) tucked away in her office, they could not presume she had other means. The journey had been long as they had to be careful to make sure they didn’t trip under the cloak, but it proved to be the best option. The corridors still had students lurking around and between Filch and Mrs. Norris there was nowhere safe to take off the cloak. Several times Mrs Norris crossed their paths and stared in their direction, but even she couldn’t see invisible people. Once they were within distance of the destination the three spotted Draco casually standing up against a wall, trying to look nonchalant. Once they neared him Harry leaned over so he could whisper to him.

“We’re here.”

Draco shivered at the bodiless voice. He whispered back while looking in the complete wrong direction. “I didn’t realise you were going to come all the way down the corridor with it on.”

“Didn’t want to get spotted by Umbridge. Long story.”

Draco nodded and walked off, refraining to beckon an empty corridor to follow. Once they reached the wall, they heard the blonde utter the password _“Ouroboros”_ and step through the now visible passage. After a bit of a struggle to fit through the passage while remaining under the cloak, the four of them slowly descended into the Slytherin common room. Although Harry and Ron had been there before if not only briefly they still did not have time to look around. Hermione, who had never been there was gazing around intently upon the surroundings. However Draco did not seem to want to give them time to dawdle, as he immediately proceeded to the boy’s dormitory. Once they were there they were in a circular room with numerous doors that had names. Draco walked over to the one furthest to the right with the name tag:

Draco Malfoy

And

Blaise Zabini

Once at the door he hesitated before turning around and staring at an empty room.

“You can take it off now, nobody will see you.” He said to thin air.

Once they took it off he smiled at them. “Nice to see you all. Hope you don’t feel too uncomfortable being in the snake pit.”

“Draco…” Ron said slowly. The blonde gave a little jump at his name being spoken by him for the first time (even Ron looked in shock at saying this). “Why does Blaise’s name have a little heart next to it?” He asked staring wide-eyed at the door.

Draco turned and looked at the name tag on the door. He sighed. “The boy is insane.” Hermione giggled as Ron just stared at the elaborate little heart that was drawn on next to it. Although unsure, it looked as if the heart was etched out of bright red lipstick.

Draco turned back to them and grinned embarrassingly. “You can turn back you know. Save yourself from the madness on the other side.”

“I heard that!” Blaise shouted from behind the door. Draco laughed as he pushed open the door and walked through, closely followed by the other three.

What they came to be standing in was a wide room decorated in various Slytherin décor. Two impressive four-poster beds sat at either ends of the room fitted with the finest silk linen they’ve ever seen. The floor was made out of beautifully polished wood with a large dark green carpet fitting nicely in the middle. Even though they were in the dungeon that didn’t stop the room from having an alcove window in the middle. Except it wasn’t the sky that was shown on the other side but the black lake. Somehow the window was enchanted so that it was able to show clearly what was on the other side, as they were able to see sporadic fish swimming occasionally. There was also another door on the side of the room, which seemingly hosted a bathroom for the two to use. Harry and Ron had always enjoyed the dormitories they shared back in Gryffindor, but after being witness to this they couldn’t help but share a twinge of jealously towards the Slytherins.

“It’s not much, but it’s home.” Said a relaxed looking Blaise who was sitting on the floor with his back up against the bed.

Ron stared at him. “Remind us never to invite you over to our dorms.”

“Oh no don’t say that.” Blaise smiled playfully. “It can’t be that bad.”

“It’s not that it’s bad. It’s that this is too good.” Said Harry who was struggling to find words to display his longing for the room.

Draco laughed. “I think you’ll have to blame Snape for that then. The heads of houses are the ones who choose the layout of the dorms. My father told me they weren’t as good as this back when he was here.”

Ron turned and looked at Harry. “We need to have a word with McGonagall, we’re living like house-elves!”

Hermione tutted.

“Come on Hermione, you gotta admit this is unfair when we’re cramped into our tiny dormitory.”

She shrugged. “My room isn’t much different from this.”

“Wait. What do you mean?” Ron asked eyes narrowing.

“You know it’s just me, Lavender and Parvati right? We all share a room much like this.”

Ron’s mouth dropped as he looked scandalised. “How come you’ve never told us that?!”

“It’s never came up in conversation Ronald. And anyway.” She looked around again. “You’ve never once complained about your dormitory.”

“That’s because I didn’t realise this was an option!”

“Only for Slytherins” Blaise added with a slight smug.

“I’m changing house.” Ron said at once.

The other boy looked at him slyly “Well if you do you’re always welcome to sleep wi-”

“- Anyway.” Draco cut into the conversation swiftly. He sat on the floor near Blaise and looked up at the trio. “Sit down, we’re still waiting on Pansy but she shouldn’t be too long.”

“Where is she?” Harry asked as he sat down next to the blonde boy.

“Searching in her trunk.” Blaise said still idly staring at Ron mischievously. “She swears she brought some firewhiskey with her.”

“We’re having firewhiskey?”

“Well of course. It wouldn’t be a party without it. I mean I am a blaze but we need some other form of fire.” He added with a wink at everyone.

“Hilarious Blaise.” Draco said sarcastically. “But yes, is alcohol a problem?”

“No.” Ron said a little too eagerly. Hermione however looked apprehensive.

“Do you guys drink often?”

“Only when the occasion calls for it. And making friends with the most interesting of Gryffindor is certainly an occasion.”

“Oh Blaise.” A voice said from the door as Pansy walked through. “You’re such a flirt. Buttering everyone up won’t excuse you for whatever improper acts you commit later.”

Blaise feigned insult. “Of course not. I don’t want to be excused at all. I want to be reprimanded.” He winked at the girl. “So did you have any?”

She grinned at him as she pulled out something from the bag she had over her shoulder. “Yep. Ogden’s finest firewhiskey.”

“Excellent.” Draco jumped up and went over to the cabinet nearest the bathroom door. He opened one of the drawers and pulled out several impressive looking glasses that had a slight green tint. Pansy walked over to him and handed him a large oval shaped bottle with a murky brown substance residing inside it. He pulled the stopper off the bottle and waited slightly as a small surge of smoke escaped it. Afterwards he poured a small amount of the liquid into each of the glasses and handed it to everyone.

Once he sat back down he looked around at everyone and smiled. He raised his glass. “To us!” He exclaimed.

“To us!” Everyone encored.

 

A few hours later, and everyone was thoroughly enjoying themselves. Hesitant at first, Hermione ironically ended up being able to handle the taste of the firewhiskey more than any of the others. The taste was unlike anything the Gryffindor three had ever experienced before. It was a strong taste that left a burning feeling in the throat. It was however quite pleasant for them all to enjoy, so as the hours went on the bottle slowly began to empty. They also had several bottles of butterbeer and numerous other treats to enjoy throughout the night.

Unbeknownst to them all (except perhaps the ever-aware Blaise), the alcohol had started to take its effect. Blaise and Hermione for example were engaged in a heavy conversation about house-elves. The boy had been quite interested in hearing about her view on elf rights, and admitted that he considered it much akin to slavery. Upon hearing that she was knitting clothes for them he insisted on helping her. This alone solidified the two’s friendship. Ron and Pansy had been listening closely, however as they were seen to have rolled their eyes several times and giggled childishly it was apparent that they had differing opinions on the topic of elves (although the alcohol may have been a factor in the matter for them as well).

“Well of course, my mother has had house-elves most of my life. But I’ve tried to tell her that she should just employ people to look after the house. She certainly has the money to afford it and I’ve told her that humans would be much more aesthetically pleasing to my eye.” He sighed. “But I think she’s quite set in her ways, she has to travel a lot so elves are easier she says.”

“Oh where does she travel?” Hermione asked, keenly interested.

“Well she has a lot of business over in America, so there’s that. She’s been to several states there, I think she’s also quite often in New York when she has to do stuff with MACUSA. She’s been over to several countries in eastern Asia too, although she’s never taken me. Then she has to travel along with her husband every now and again so she visits Europe a fair bit too.”

“Oh does he work there?”

“He has investments there, so I’m told. More money than sense if you ask me.” He laughed.

“What do you want to do when you’ve left Hogwarts?” Ron said slowly as his head swayed to put Blaise’s head in focus.

“Oh no you don’t want to be asking that.” Pansy said giggling. “He has a different answer for everyday of the week when that’s concerned.

“True.” Blaise said as he looked at the empty glass in his hand. “But if I make the wrong choice I could be stuck in a job unhappy for the rest of my life.”

“So you got no idea then?” Hermione asked in a would-be sympathetic voice if she wasn’t trying to supress the casual giggling she had developed after the umpteenth glass of firewhiskey.

“Well I wouldn’t say I have no idea.” He said still staring blankly. “I’d like to be happy, but I suppose we all want that.”

Ron nodded. “Agreed.”

Blaise turned towards him and winked with a wide grin of his face. “You would make me very happy.”

Pansy cackled as Ron turned bright red. It took Hermione several seconds to acknowledge what Blaise had said. When she did she let out an Indignant _“Hey!”_ at the boy.

“Oh don’t worry.” He said to her playfully while winking at her as well. “You’d make me very happy also.”

It was Hermione’s turn to turn bright red as Pansy continued to cackle. “You should be wary of this one. His bark isn’t nearly as bad as his bite. Worse is when you start to enjoy it!” She laughed louder. After a moment her eyes widened in sudden realisation at something. “Where’s the other two?”

“Behind me.” Blaise said smugly tilting his head back so it partially went over the top of the bed he was leaning against. Pansy looked over his shoulder to see the blonde and the raven head sitting back to back apparently drunk on Blaise’s bed.

“Hello over there!” She shouted over to them still giggling slightly and waving manically.

Draco, who was facing the wall swayed slightly as he turned to look at her. “You called?”

Blaise purred as he tried to tilt his head back far enough to see them. “You two having fun are we?”

“Course.” Harry said hazily as he looked down at the boy’s face staring up at him. He prodded him on the cheek. “You?”

“Course I am.” He winked at the raven head. “I’m in the presence of such beautiful things. Couldn’t be happier.”

Draco rotated until his legs were side by side with Harry’s, his front up against the raven head’s back. Harry could even feel the slight breath from the blonde on the side as his neck as he stared at Blaise with mystified grey eyes. “No flirting you.”

“Jealous much are we?” Blaise chided.

“You flirt with too many people you do.” Draco responded.

“Well as long as they’re not taken and fine with it, not hurting anyone. Except my own dignity of course.” Him and everyone on the floor laughed as he still stared up at Harry.

Harry couldn’t help but lean into the back of Draco as he felt the warm breath on his neck. It felt soothing to him. They had talked about anything and everything the past few hours and it made the raven head feel so relaxed, more so than he had in ages. After a few moments, or maybe hours, he wasn’t quite sure, but he noticed that Draco had his arms on either side of Harry, almost as if he was holding him. Harry wasn’t sure but he knew it felt nice.

“Hey.” He said, leaning back against the blonde and turning slightly.

“Hey. You alright?”

“Suppose. You know your arms are around me right?”

“Oh.” Draco said turning red. “I’m sorry do you want me to move them?” He started to pull his arms back but Harry stopped him.

“No, it’s alright, it feels good.” He wiggled slightly a bit to close the little space they had between them.

The blonde smiled as he leant closer towards him. “Harry.”

“Draco?”

“Everyone’s asleep.”

Harry turned and looked. He wasn’t wrong, everyone had fallen asleep. Pansy and Ron were flat out on the carpet, Ron slightly snoring with a bottle beside him. Hermione and Blaise were sitting with their back against the bed still, with one (Blaise) lolling his head on the other’s shoulder.

“Should we sleep?” He asked.

“I suppose. Do you want to take the bed?” Draco breathed into his ear.

“Don’t leave. You’re comfy.”

Draco moved a bit back and pulled Harry with him. In a matter of moments they were lying on the bed with their head on the pillows staring at each other. Harry realised once again how pretty the blonde’s eyes were, which luckily due to his slight intoxication there was no objection to this thought in his head.

Draco chuckled. “You have pretty eyes too. Like emeralds”

The raven head stared. “Did I say that out loud?”

 “I read your mind silly.”

“Then what am I thinking right now?” Harry asked mildly.

“You’re thinking kiss me.”

“Am I?”

“I hope so.”

“Try it.”

Draco paused for a moment before he leant in and waited, Harry reciprocated. They were both drunk, tired and comfortable in each others presence. But most importantly, they kissed.


	4. Discussions, dating and a war is coming.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The events of the night before, how does remembering that turn out?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Sorry sorry sorry for taking my time. Life got ahead of me, so much... good and bad, got a shiny new laptop and was breaking it in...   
> But i'm back, well I wasn't really gone I suppose...
> 
> Chapter 4!! :D

When Harry woke up, his head was banging slightly and his eyesight was cloudy. He struggled to remember the chain of events, but as his eyesight improved and he realised that the surrounding area was filled with various Slytherin themed décor, his mind raced through the last night. Remembering drinking firewhisky, playing exploding snap, watching Blaise flirt with everyone, having a heart to heart with Draco, Draco… If anyone would have seen Harry in that moment when he recalled the pinnacle of the night that happened with the blonde, they would have seen his face pale tremendously and his whole figure go rigid. His head ached as he tried to straighten out all his thoughts, but had he actually kissed him? He remembered sitting with him, talking for what seemed like hours on end. Then they decided to go to sleep, together? But the blonde had read Harry’s mind… no the raven head just said it out loud cause he’s an idiot. Then they kissed.

Harry didn’t know how to deal with this. Did he like Draco like that? Did the blonde like him? Or perhaps was it all just the excess amount of alcohol they consumed, messing with their thoughts and perceptions. It was because of the alcohol that he was now struggling to form an appropriate answer to each of these questions, he thought. At least, he hoped it was. Draco had been his first kiss, that was for certain. Nobody had ever kissed him on the lips before. Closing his eyes, he attempted to remember how the kiss felt. It had been soft, tender and extremely intimate. Harry had moved his hand over the blonde’s waist while he himself put his hand up to the raven head’s cheek. His eyes had been closed through it, and he was certain that Draco’s had been too. There had been a rush of ecstasy that surged through his entire body as their lips touched and a feeling of extreme pleasure when the blonde’s tongue played against his. The kiss had felt like it went on forever, but he remembered the feeling of longing when they separated, and fell asleep entwined on the bed. It had overall seemed to be an enjoyable experience, Harry thought. But the kiss aside, there was more pressing matters to consider right now. Most important was this: the raven head remembered clearly falling asleep next to the blonde. Does that mean they were still next to each other?

Turning his head slightly, his questions were answered. Lying next to him under the cover was a Draco Malfoy. He was lying on his back, much like Harry was. Fast asleep with his face aimed up at the ceiling there was an air of tranquillity around him that the raven head enjoyed seeing. The blonde hair, dishevelled from the night before was now slightly curly and set on his head in what looked like a rather cute fringe. Not noticing that he had once again associated a word he wouldn’t usually use with Draco, Harry continued to look at him for a while. As he did so, there was a fluttering feeling that lurched around his stomach that he wasn’t sure he had felt before. So much had happened in such a short space of time that Harry wasn’t really sure what to do with himself, and as he tried to move his arms another thing was to be added to the list. His right arm moved easily, but while attempting to lift up his left arm he was made aware that his hand had been gripped around something. It was Draco’s hand, holding tight onto the raven head’s own. This now posed a problem to Harry. If he tried to move away his hand it may wake up the other boy. Although he was certain that he was overthinking all of this, Harry couldn’t help but feel mildly anxious about this. He wasn’t exactly sure that he wanted to leave the bed, but now that he could feel the life in his left hand returning he felt constricted on moving without disturbing Draco’s blissful sleep. A quick decision made, Harry leant forward towards the other boy.

“Hey, Draco?” There was no response so the raven head leant even closer until he was right by the blonde’s ear. “Draco, can you wake up please?”

Eyes opened slowly as the boy turned to face Harry. His expression was clear, he had a bit too much to drink and was suffering for it. “Yeah?” He said rather weakly.

“Uhm- I didn’t wanna bother you but, your hand… it’s kind of stopping me from moving.” Harry said shyly.

Draco’s eyes widened more as he wriggled slightly until realising what his hand had been holding. His face reddened deeply and he pulled his hand away from Harry’s. “Sorry. I didn’t realise.” He stuttered.

“Its fine.” Harry sat up a bit to stretch his arms before moving to place himself in a more comfortable position while looking at the blonde. “I was just worried about waking you up.”

The blonde groaned slightly and squinted. “I feel awful, how much did we drink last night?”

“I think we finished off the firewhisky pretty fast before Blaise realised he had his own bottle.” Harry said thoughtfully.

Draco grinned slightly before regretting the pain it caused his head. He spoke with his eyes shut. “Blaise didn’t realise, he knew the whole time. He just wanted to piss off Pansy. Did we drink all of his bottle too?”

“I think so. Along with several butterbeers.”

“Oh yeah, last night was fun.”

Harry paused at this, wondering what to say. “Do you remember how last night ended?” He said slowly.

The blonde opened one of his eyes. “Maybe, do you?”

Cheeks reddening slightly, Harry swallowed. “I uh- yeah.” He nodded.

There was a couple minutes of silence between the two as they both stared at each other, not wanting to be the first to break the silence.

It was Draco who eventually broke it. He scrunched his face up a bit before looking directly at the other boy. He pulled his hand from under the covers to cough into his clenched fist, as if he was about to say an important speech. “Well. I ugh -” He coughed again “- enjoyed it. Did you?”

“I did.” Harry replied a little too quickly. “I mean.” He tried to regain his composure. “It was my first kiss.”

Draco’s eyes widened upon hearing this. “Your first kiss? Really?”

The raven head nodded, now feeling strangely worried. “Wasn’t it yours?”

“Yeah but I’d never have thought it was your first kiss too, I mean… its you!” He said slightly loudly in hysteria. “who would miss a chance to kiss you?”

“I’ve never really given anyone a chance I suppose. But why haven’t you kissed anyone.”

Draco’s face reddened even more as he stuttered. “I su-suppose I uh-”

“- Draco the absolute sweetheart has refused nearly every kiss that has been offered to him. Even from me.” A very gallant voice echoed through the room.

Harry and Draco whipped round (The latter cursed under his breath at the pain it caused moving his so quickly) to see a very calm looking Blaise not even looking at them propped up at the end of the bed gazing at his fingernails.

“Blaise!” the blonde nearly shouted. “What are you doing here?”

“Well this is my bed after all, shouldn’t I be here?” He said still not looking at either of them but instead studying his nails seemingly intrinsically.

“How long were you listening? Harry asked quickly.

Blaise turned and smiled widely. “Long enough, I came in about ten minutes ago. I must have woke you up because you moved slightly. So I thought I’d sit and watch what happened.”

“Why?” the blonde exclaimed.

Blaise shrugged. “Seemed like a good idea at the time. So…-” He looked mischievously at them both. “- Do either of you deny anything you said?”

Both the boys knew it would be pointless to lie, but it was Draco who spoke. He sighed “No.”

“Well well well.” Blaise said grinning devilishly at the both of them. “How _very_ interesting.”

“What are you planning?” the blonde demanded.

“Me? I don’t know what you mean Draco.” He said in a dismal attempt to sound innocent.

“I know that face Blaise, guilt is written all over it. You’re already plotting something.”

Blaise snorted. “Even if I was planning something, you won’t find out until I want you too.” He jumped up and sat on the edge of the bed, his whole demeanour having changed. He looked straight at Harry. “So how was it?”

Harry spluttered. “Hu-what? What do you mean how was it?”

“The kiss!” He said impatiently. “Was it good, fast, longing, lousy, wet? Did he bite, did _you_ bite?” His eyes widened to that of a teenager girl as he looked imploringly to the raven head for answers.

Harry felt slightly vulnerable in a weird way as he lay there in bed with the blonde wile being stared at by Blaise. He didn’t know how to answer the question as he had never done it before. He didn’t want to say anything that wouldn’t give the kiss justice, especially as he had no idea what could be potentially said that would end up unintentionally hurting Draco’s feelings. Luckily he didn’t have to speak because the blonde interjected.

“Enough Blaise.” He said faux-calmly while staring daggers at him.

Blaise’s smile fell as he looked at the Draco like a lost puppy. “But but but. Cant I just-“

“- No.” Draco sighed at him. “Where is everyone else?”

“Oh. It took you long enough to notice.”

“Notice what?” Harry asked.

“The other three are gone.”

Harry sat up a bit and stared around. Aside from Blaise, none of the others were here. He thought he’d have noticed this when he had woken up, but he supposed that there were more pressing matters on his mind. “Where are they?”

“Having tea in Pansy’s room.” He jumped off the bed and leant against one of the sides. “You both looked so peaceful in your sleep, although you were in a different position to what you are now, so we just thought to not wake you.”

Both the other boy’s blushed deeply. Draco asked timidly. “How were we sleeping?”

“Like two cute adorable puppies that didn’t want to be away from eachother.” He said playfully. “But Pansy wants you both to come over. So get ready and come over.” He moved from the side and bowed deeply at them. When he stood back up he grinned. “Now don’t be too long, or I may have to tell the others what I heard.”

“Don’t you dare.” Draco growled.

Blaise winked and strode out the door.

The blonde turned towards the other boy and sighed. “Sorry about that. He’s such an idiot sometimes honestly.”

Harry nodded as he stared at the door Blaise just went through. He pushed himself down a bit until he was level with the blonde again before replying. “Draco?”

“Yeah?”

“Where do we go from here?” Harry cringed at the way he asked the question.

The blonde looked sheepishly towards the other. “I dunno, where can we go?”

Harry shrugged. “I’m not good at this stuff… We were drunk, so does that mean we should just forget about it if y-”

“- Did you want to forget it?” Draco said, interrupting what the other boy had been saying.

“I -uh, no I don’t think so?”

The blonde breathed deeply. “Good, I hoped you’d say that.”

Harry’s insides fluttered. “So what do we do now?”

Draco laughed. “Harry I’m as new to all this as you are. I have no idea.” He rubbed his hand over his face. “But maybe we should think about this later, Pansy expects us soon I bet.”

“If you think that’s fine?”

Draco sat up and moved his legs over the bed. “Nope.” He said as he turned towards Harry. “But I’d rather be alive to discuss it with you than dead. Pansy’s always impatient.” He stood up and moved over to the bathroom and put his hand on the door. He looked back around and grinned. “But don’t worry, I want a chance to kiss you again.” He walked into the bathroom, fully aware that Harry had just blushed a very crimson red.

*

Once Harry and Draco felt respectable enough, (although the both still felt weak from the hangover) they walked over to Pansy’s room and knocked. After hearing a shrill ‘come in’ they pushed the door and entered through. The room was similar to that of Draco’s, although it was slightly larger to accommodate three beds. In the centre of the room was a large circular table which had the four of them sitting around it looking expectedly at them. Ron, Harry saw looked worse for wear than the rest of them, and was holding his mug of tea close to his lips in what looked like an attempt to breathe in the steam. Hermione and Pansy had their hair tied back and were wearing matching dressing gowns (no doubt Pansy borrowed one to the other girl). Blaise just looked at the two boys smirking slightly as he sipped his tea.

“Well sit down.” Pansy said cheerfully, beckoning them over and beginning to pour tea for them. As they sat down next to each other she passed them a mug each. “I thought everyone would enjoy a bit of tea to help recover. Although.” She paused and looks over at Ron who is holding the mug to his face with his eyes closed. “It doesn’t seem to help everyone does it?”

“Be kind to the poor boy Pansy.” Blaise said playfully. “He did well to drink so much, not many people can keep up with me.”

Pansy sighed before looking at the other two boys. She raised her eyebrows and asked in an unnaturally casual voice. “Did you two sleep well?”

Although Harry had been sipping his tea, he couldn’t help but notice that Hermione’s attentiveness sharpened at the question as she looked at the two of them. Even Ron managed to open his eyes slightly at it. Blaise on the other hand was busy pouring himself another mug of tea and didn’t give a slight impression that he cared much for the question. However before Harry could give Pansy an answer Draco stepped in.

“Slept as well as we could have given the circumstances I suppose.” The blonde boy said while yawning. “Yourselves?”

“Oh we slept fine. Considering we slept on the floor. “She added.” But when we got up to wake you two we saw you were both… looking quite happy where you were.” She sipped a large part of her tea as her eyes gleamed in a waggish manner.

“I don’t know what you mean Pansy.” Draco said truthfully.

“Well you both looked so happy to be there that we didn’t want to wake you up.”

“Well of course we were happy, it was a good night.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Then elaborate.” Draco growled slightly.

Before either could continue Blaise interjected with a loud sigh. “You were cuddling eachother. It was quite adorable actually.”

“Oh.” Draco said. “I don’t think we fell asleep that way.”

“How did you fall asleep then?” Pansy asked curiously.

Draco looked at Harry who looked back at him. Both stared at each other in silence, wishing they were able to converse telepathically.

“We uh, we-“

“- We just fell asleep after we saw everyone else did, that’s all.” Harry interjected upon the blonde’s stuttering.

Pansy’s eyebrows rose higher as she looked at them both. “That’s all?”

The both nodded.

“Then how do you explain the cuddling?” Blaise asked, attempting to supress his glee.

The blonde glared daggers at him. “I suppose it was cold.”

“And the happy faces you both had?”

“Are we not allowed to be happy now?.”

Blaise looked at him, as devilish as ever. His mind was working overspeed, that much was clear to Harry. He already knew what was coming, but he still braced for the impact. Finally Blaise let out slowly, delight and a garnish of teasing on every single word. “And the kiss?”

The impact hit. Pansy shrieked while slapping Hermione’s side while screaming ‘I knew it!’ Hermione looked incredibly smug at the both of them as she sipped her tea and tried to calm the other girl down. Ron’s eyes widened in unexpectedness as he stared at both the boys. Harry just looked back at him trying to issue some sort of explanation through his eyes. Unfortunately it didn’t work. Draco on the other hand picked up a shortbread and launched it at Blaise who effortlessly spelled it away with a wave of his wand.

“Blaise you absolute bastard!” the blonde snarled.

“Oh probably but mother would rather die before telling me!” He responded playfully.

“How could you say it!”

“I didn’t realise it was something I was meant to keep quiet.”

“I hate you.”

“You love me.”

Draco just glared at him, apparently holding back the urge to throw something else at him as his hand played with another piece of shortbread. Once Pansy had calmed down she let out a long hoot and giggled to herself before she looked at the two boys again.

“Well that certainly explains the cuddling.”

“Shut it.” The blonde said now looking at her.

“Oh Draco calm down.” She said playfully. “Nobody else is going to find out, your secret is safe with us. Isn’t it Blaise?”

“Absolutely.” He added now back to sipping his tea.

“Now then… does that mean you two are dating?” She asked a little too eagerly.

Draco just reddened as he mumbled something.

“Say that again?” She enquired.

“We haven’t discussed it yet.” He said a bit louder.

“Well go on, discuss.” Blaise said, enjoying himself far too much.

There was silence between the table as nobody knew what to say next. Draco glanced towards Harry and wondered if the raven head felt as uncomfortable as he did right now. Neither of them were angry towards Blaise for mentioning the kiss, however the conversation regarding their current status was heavily more embarrassing. One drunken kiss was fine, their romantic intentions for each other wasn’t something they wasn’t to discuss with everyone before they even discussed it with themselves.

“You don’t have to answer that.” A voice said. Harry looked up and saw the voice had came from Ron’s mouth, who hadn’t spoken until now. “If you two haven’t even discussed it yet there’s no point doing it till you have some time to.”

Harry just nodded, in awe at the reaction from his best friend. Blaise however looked disheartened. “But they’re going to tell us anyway so why not just cut the middle man out and do it with us here.”

“You’re just being nosy.” Ron said hoarsely (It seemed the alcohol had affected his voice, Harry thought).

Blaise just sipped his tea silently attempting his hardest to look nonchalant, although he couldn’t help but smirk a tiny bit.

*

Pansy explained to the Gryffindor trio that she had asked her roommates to disappear for the morning so she could have the room to herself (“It’s normally me, Millicent and Daphne here. But we do each other favours all the time. This’ll probably mean I’ll have to cover them if they don’t turn up to class or something”). Once they had considerably sobered up after drinking several mugs of tea, the day was open at their whim. Blaise was quite keen on keeping them all together throughout the day, and Harry had a sneaking suspicion it was to make sure that he and Draco had that discussion. They decided to get some of what could be the last bit of sunshine this year, however Pansy refused to go out until she had properly washed herself, and Blaise joked that they all needed to ‘wash their shame away’ (while looking intently at Harry and Draco). So by the time they had all managed to be properly washed and clean it was well past midday before they left the dormitory room. The three Slytherin’s went a bit ahead of them as they made their way downstairs to make sure the coast was clear for the other trio (who were under the invisibility cloak) to get through. However as they were walking across the room they were stopped by someone calling them.

“Draco!”

They turned to see Theo striding towards them. The tension in the room heightened as everyone watched the boy engage the blonde. “You’ve been avoiding me.” He huffed.

“What gave you that impression?” Sneered Draco who was standing his ground against Theo.

“Don’t play around with me Draco. We all know you have been. Now it turns out you’re best friends with Potter and his cronies. What’s that about?”

“So what if I am. Is that a problem to you?”

Theo’s eyes widened in surprised. Clearly he was under the impression that Draco was going to refute the accusation. “So it’s true then. And were you in detention with Potter?”

“It wasn’t what you’d call detention, remedial transfiguration so to speak.” The blonde said coolly.

“What’s happened to you Malfoy. You spent the good part of four years at odds with him now you’re in remedial lessons? What’s going on?”

“I’ve chosen to put aside my differences and make friends with him. So what. We’re past the age of petty rivalries don’t you think Theo?”

The boy looked and stared at the blonde, gazing intently on the hope that he would see something that would explain what was happening. The whole room was looking on towards them, holding on to every word.

“Where do your loyalties lie Malfoy?” Theo finally said.

Draco looked taken aback at the question. It took him just under a minute to get his thoughts together before he replied. “My family. As it always has been.”

Theo took a step forward until he was right next to the blonde. He whispered low into his ear to prevent the rest of the room from listening. After he was done he moved back slightly and looked at the other boy who nodded curtly. With that Theo strode away up to the dormitories. Without a second longer Draco walked over to the exit of the common room, closely followed by Pansy, Blaise and the Gryffindor trio. They walked through the passage and out onto the corridor in silence. Once they reached the end of the corridor and Blaise had made sure there was nobody coming down from the other end, the Gryffindors took off the cloak.

“What was all that about?” Harry asked as he opened his bag to stuff the cloak in.

“We’d all like to know.” Blaise said nodding.

“Theo was just giving me a warning.”

“What sort of warning?” Pansy said raising her eyebrow.

Draco sighed. “He said he doesn’t really care if I’m friends with Harry or not. But it could attract unwanted attention.” He looked at Harry and gave the answer to the question the raven head was thinking. “It doesn’t really show what side he’s on. He might just be doing it cause our families old friends. He might even think you-know-Who told me to do this.”

“Tricky situation.” Blaise whispered. They all nodded in agreement.

“Are you worried?” Hermione asked.

 Draco laughed grimly. “It doesn’t matter. I’m breaking all the rules now anyway. Come on let’s go.” With that he strode in the direction of the entrance hall to lead out into the grounds.

 

The walk to the ground had been a pleasant one. Most the school was out also enjoying the sunlight but they still managed to get their favourite tree (which was oddly both trios preferred resting spot in the grounds). They sat down under the shade of the tree and continued chatting, uninterrupted from the rest of the world. It seemed that they had so much to talk about that time started to fly by.

“Shall we have a picnic?” Blaise proclaimed after Ron’s stomach let out a hungry rumble.

“Where are we going to get food from?” Hermione asked.

“The Kitchens of course.”

Hermione pursed her lips. It was clear she was not looking forward to the idea of making the house-elves cook them food. Blaise saw the look on her face and recalculated.

“What if we ask that house-elf?”

“You mean Dobby?” Harry said.

“Yeah. Dobby” Blaise grinned. “We can offer to pay him, or even buy him some clothes. That way he’s not doing it for free is he?” He looked imploringly at Hermione.

She thought for a few moments before saying slowly. “I suppose we can.” She then smiled. “Then I can find out how many elves have taken the clothes I’ve knit!”

Ron sat up abruptly. “You’re not going to go to the kitchen too are you?”

“Well I -”

“- How about us four go and leave dear Draco and Harry hear to hold the tree for us?” Blaise chipped in.

Now it was Draco’s turn to sit up abruptly and stare accusingly towards the other boy. “I see what you’re trying to do.”

Blaise shrugged. “We do need food though.”

“I agree.” Ron added.

Pansy sighed. “Come on then. You three up.” She commanded to them. She stood up and looked at the blonde and the raven head. “Don’t get too comfortable while we’re gone.” She smirked. She grabbed Blaise by the arm and headed off back to the castle, closely followed by Hermione and Ron (who by the looks of things, was starting to worry about the former’s reaction to finding out who has been taking all the knitwear).

Harry watched them go as Draco rubbed his temples and sighed. “What are they all playing at.”

The raven head shrugged and turned towards the blonde. “You tell me.”

“Hmm. I suppose Blaise is trying to play matchmaker. Or maybe he just wants a bit of chaos. Hard to tell really.”

Harry chuckled. “So, should we have that discussion?”

“I suppose we must. It’s all going rather fast isn’t it?”

“Last week we became friends on top of the astronomy tower, last night we kissed. I guess it is.” Harry nodded.

“So, about that kiss…” Draco began.

“What about it?” replied the raven head, who was slowly blushing.

“Was I any good?”

The other boy laughed out loud. “I said I enjoyed it didn’t I?”

“I know but, we were drunk. You might not have been thinking clearly. I wanted to ask you once you sobered up properly.”

Harry grinned widely at Draco. “Yeah, you were good. For a first kiss I’d rate it at least a solid E”

“An E?!” The blonde said in mock outrage.

“I never expected you to kiss me, so I suppose you exceeded my expectance by doing it.” He laughed back.

“I’ll have to make sure the next one is a solid O then.”

“Next time…” Harry trailed on, more to himself than anything.

“If you want a next time that is.” Draco said quickly.

Harry thought about it. He had come to terms that the feelings he felt while kissing Draco had been positive ones, and since being friends with him he’s had nothing but good feelings about the other boy. He even admitted to himself that he found the blonde quite an attractive guy, his pale skin matching perfectly with his stormy grey eyes, only to be enhanced by his radiant blonde hair. He wasn’t quite sure how long he had felt this way about him, surely no longer than the week? But when he thought about it, had the years of rivalry just been a way to diffuse hormonal attraction.

“Is this new for you?” Harry blurted out.

Draco looked shocked and raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean? I said I -”

“ -No not like that. I mean.” Harry paused to swallow before continuing. “Is whatever you might be feeling for me new? Or is this something you’ve had for a while?”

The blonde closed his mouth and looked at the raven head thoughtfully. His grey eyes stared right at the green eyes across from him before he spoke. “I guess, I’ve liked you in a way like that for a long time…” He whispered it slowly knowing that Harry was holding onto every word. “There was always something about you I couldn’t let go of. It’s so cliché but, I wanted you so much I was willing to get on your bad side just to interact with you. I’ve never really had feelings like being attracted or smitten towards anyone. But I always knew that some part of me wanted a chance to get to know you. When I got that chance last week, it’s been amazing so far. I know we’ve only been friends for a short while, and I know how cringey all of this is but, if I have a chance to take it further with you, then I’m not going to wait. We could all die tomorrow anyway with you-know-who about so. Yeah.” He looked away in embarrassment and ran his hand over his hair.

Harry was lost for words. He felt amazed that someone, let alone Draco Malfoy of all people, could feel something like this for him. But as happy as he felt, he couldn’t help but feel slightly anxious at it all. As a child, one of the few things he was able to do at the Dursley’s house was read. He had read so many children’s books, and many books not for children. A lot of them concerned romance between young people, teenagers and the like. Not all of them, in fact many of them didn’t end up with a happy ending. From everything he had read Harry had seen that young love was a fantasy, that kids rush into on a plight for happiness but come out only with heartbreak. Was it something he wanted to risk himself? Did he want to go through that pain, or to have Draco go through that pain? It was all made worse by the looming feeling that they were at war. How could he even start something like that when there was a risk of death for himself, and for anyone close to him. But then, as he looked over at Draco who was still looking the other way. Why shouldn’t he? The last four years he spent saving precious stones and Hogwarts, preventing the rise of Voldermort, fighting dragons and all sorts of creatures. Doesn’t he deserve to sometimes have something he wanted? Did he want Draco? It certainly felt that way, since getting to know him, spending detention with him… kissing him.

He reached out to put his hand on the blonde’s shoulder, who slightly jumped in shock to the touch and turned around.

“I like you.” Harry said to him.

“You do?”

The raven head laughed. “Of course I do you idiot. I think I’ve probably liked you for a while now.”

Draco’s eyes widened. “Does that mean you’ll…” His words trailed off as he lost his confidence.

“It’s like you said. We could all die tomorrow.” Harry said simply.

A whole two seconds passed before the blonde launched himself onto the raven head, faces smashing together as he locked in to kiss him once again, this time completely sober. His hands wrapped around Harry’s waist as he pulled him closer towards him. The feeling of ecstasy rushed through the both of them as they realised how much they wanted this, how good it felt. The butterflies in the raven head’s stomach bashed around inside excitedly as he achieved what he subconsciously wanted. His hands reached up to the blonde’s face, as one of them gripped his cheek and the other ran itself over his neck, making the boy shudder slightly. The kiss went on for what felt like ages, neither wanting to be the first to let go. Eventually though they both mutually pulled apart from each other, hands falling to grip onto one another tightly.

“Does this mean we’re dating then?” Draco asked, slightly panting at the euphoria surging through him.

“Yep.” Smiled Harry, feeling happier than he has in ages.

“Do we tell the others?”

Both the boys were thinking the same thing, but it was Harry who got to speak it first. “Maybe, just for the first week. We keep it between us. To keep it special.”

Draco smiled at him. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.” He leant in and kissed the raven head again, thanking the stars above him for finally giving him the chance he’s been waiting for.

 

*

 

A couple hours later Harry found himself happily sitting in the Gryffindor common room, thinking over all that had happened in the last couple days, something he had done now for the umpteenth time. The picnic they had had was quite enjoyable, between Blaise and Ron they managed to bring back a large amount of food. Also Hermione somehow managed to not be made aware of Dobby taking all the knitwear, as she had been too preoccupied with Winky who was been present in the kitchens at the time. On their return Blaise all but demanded to know if Harry and Draco discussed the night before, to which they lied most convincingly ‘no’. While Blaise was not impressed that they hadn’t taken advantage of the situation, Pansy and Hermione shushed him into not complaining. Therefore they all happily ate by the tree as the late afternoon went on and by the time they finished it had started to get darker. Before the two groups finally departed Draco pulled Harry away from them to have a moment in private, which didn’t go unnoticed by Blaise but nobody else found it too strange to question. Knowing that they couldn’t kiss (yet) in front of their friends, the blonde whispered to the other that he’d try and find some time for them to spend alone over the next week, which the raven head looked forward to. So as Harry sat staring at the fire, he couldn’t help but feel positive about the next week to come.

“Harry!”

The boy turned to his friend. “Yeah?”

“It’s Sirius!”

He whipped his head around to stare at the fireplace which now had the shape of his godfather’s face formed upon it.

“Hello Harry.” He smiled up at his godson who leapt down to the fireplace towards him.

“Sirius! What are you doing here?”

“Fulfilling my duties as your godfather and answering your letter.” He said hastily. “Now, as for your scar, don’t worry about it too much. With Voldemort back it’s bound to hurt every now and again, I know it hurts but try to stay strong.

“Okay…” Harry trailed off slightly irked at the lack of a decent response.

“I know that’s not the answer you probably wanted Harry but that’s really as much as anyone can offer you. Now, can you show me your hand?”

“How do you know about that?” Harry said as he slowly pulled out his hand.

“McGonagall let us know the moment she found out.” Sirius gazed at Harry’s hand with an intense hatred spreading through his face. “As your godfather, I’d quite like to go through this fireplace and strangle the woman.”

“Sirius!” Hermione exclaimed while Harry and Ron laughed.

“I know I can’t.” He grimaced. “Doesn’t mean I’m not allowed to want to. She’s a foul woman that Umbridge. You should hear Remus speak about her.”

“Does he know her then?” Ron asked.

“No. But she’s drafted legislation that’s made living life as a werewolf a lot harder for him. She hates part humans. Spent a lot of her career campaigning against them.” He scowled.

“She’s evil.” Harry sighed.

“Evil isn’t the word. She’s zealous about her career. Being Fudge’s lapdog gives her power to further it.” He paused before looking at Harry intently. “That’s why I wanted to see you, we’ve uh- found out something that you’re not going to like.”

“What?” The three said.

“Well. It seems that a few new laws are going to be passed tomorrow. We’re not sure on the specifics but we think they’re aimed at giving her a bit more power around the school.”

“What does that mean?” Harry said, dreading the answer.

Sirius didn’t look at him in response. “It means that you might have to go through your detention with Umbridge.”

“He can’t!” Hermione exclaimed.

“Have you seen his hand!” Ron demanded.

“Look, I know it’s not easy. I’m his godfather, seeing what she’s made him do makes me feel sick. But I can’t do anything, and McGonagall won’t be able to protect you again if we assume the worst is coming.”

Harry just sat and stared at his godfather, sadness welling up inside him. He didn’t blame him, he saw how pained Sirius must feel to have to relay this to him. But all the happiness that had happened in the last few days seemed to have left him. Was he going to have to face Umbridge’s torture after all?

“Harry, listen to me. No matter what happens, you need to make sure you stay out of trouble when it concerns that woman. She’ll be looking for a chance to see you suffer.”

The boy nodded.

“Now, one last thing before I go. We heard from McGonagall that you seem to have made friends with some snakes, is that true?”

Harry reddened slightly. “Uh- yeah.”

“I hope you’re being careful.”

“What do you mean?” The boy asked quickly. “He’s not a death eater!”

“I know that. But his father is, even if he’s a reluctant one from our intel. But I’m more worried about you attracting unwanted attention. There’s only so many people you can trust at Hogwarts.”

“I know.” Harry sighed. “Does that mean you’re okay with me being friends with him?” He added quickly.

“Of course.” Sirius smiled. “We need as many allies as we can get. But more than that, McGonagall told us you’ve all been getting on well together, so if that’s the case then you have my blessing.”

“Thanks Sirius.”

“I’m only doing my duty as your godfather. Now, if anything happens, you won’t hesitate to owl me?”

“No.”

“And you’ll try to not argue with Umbridge?”

“I won’t.”

“Good. I don’t know if I’ll be able to risk coming to the fireplace again, so let’s hope I won’t need to.”

“Goodnight Sirius, and thanks.” Harry said sincerely. The other two nodded.

There was a tiny pop, and the place where Sirius’s head had been was flickering flame once more.

 

*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I really feel like this chapter makes or breaks it now... I'm sorry if you think its all so quick.. my logic is that teenage romance always happens quickly (from personal experience) and well, they are in a war so why not? 
> 
> Also next chapter will be my attempt to make it as dark as humanly possible (manic laugh) no more happiness for a while... Umbridge will have her revenge!

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed it!  
> If I made any mistakes let me know, god its scary business writing...
> 
> I shall try to keep this updated. Its made me pretty happy so far writing it
> 
> Thankyou so much for reading!


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